


The Roommate

by DoAsYouWill



Category: South Park
Genre: M/M, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-05
Updated: 2018-10-18
Packaged: 2018-11-09 10:41:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 30
Words: 299,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11102877
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoAsYouWill/pseuds/DoAsYouWill
Summary: Craig is off to college, where he is introduced to the weirdest person he's ever met. Unfortunately, or maybe fortunately, (Craig can't decide), that weirdest person is his roommate.Just your typical cliche 'meet as roommates' story, but with a lot of nostalgic undertones.





	1. Tweek

“You know,” my mother mused thoughtfully, adjusting the strap of her purse on her shoulder, “You’re finally going to college. You should feel liberated or something, right?”

“Real supportive, Mom,” I answered, exhibiting my practiced Tucker stoicism.

“I’m just saying, you’re in college. You can drink without your father and I breathing down your neck all the time. And now's your time to experiment before you have to settle down with a job and a wife, or a husband or whatever." _Thanks, Mom_ , I thought with an inner eye roll. "Try pot. Acid. Chew some mushrooms. But stay away from meth and heroin, as a favor to me. Have all the unprotected sex you want. Just don't expect your father or I to help feed it." She looked at me for a few seconds before adding, "I mean, I’ll miss you and all, but now I can finally have my own room to escape your father whenever he pisses me off.”

Great. Like I needed in on the problems in my parent’s marriage. And shit, my mother truly was a Fischer through and through. She was, in theory, a terrible mom, and a shitty role model, (like I ever thought of her as that), and didn't really seem like she was on my side, _ever_ , and seemed more like an obnoxious older sister most of the time, but she was there when it counted. And I loved her and shit, even though I didn’t really show it. And, despite the fact that she clearly took after her own mother, who was extremely sarcastic, she definitely had the Tucker trait of not giving a fuck about literally anything. It was my greatest pride, the fact that I could get away with not caring, because it’s expected of me. _That’s_ liberating, if nothing else is.

My father, on the other hand, was a brick wall 100% of the time. I mean, don’t get me wrong, my mother was no kiss-on-the-forehead-whenever-I-left-the-house, hugs-before-bed kind of woman, but I did get the occasional, reassuring, “I love you.” Dad probably acted like an actual dad maybe . . . once? And that was when I asked my parents if they’d let me box, (like with my fists), as a hobby. See, Thomas Tucker was terrified I’d turn out gay, because I didn’t really show any interest in sports. As far as he was concerned, not caring about sports and wanting to watch Red Racer and read comic books was just a sure sign of homosexuality. That, and I've never had a girlfriend before. But, lucky for him, I’d decided that dick really wasn't my cup of tea. And he was so fucking excited that he actually hugged me and told me he was proud of me.

I’m not going to lie, that fucked with my head a little more than I was willing to admit. And I’m surprised I’m admitting it now.

Anyway, I didn’t really deem my lovely mother’s answer worthy of a reply more than a casual middle finger. Or, I lifted my middle finger slightly; I had all my bags for college hanging off of various parts of my body, and my arms were completely full. I couldn't afford to move around too much, or I'd drop something. 

We walked in silence for a little longer before I tripped over my own feet, (which I swear is actually pretty rare for me; I’m not known for being clumsy), and dropped one of my heavy bags on my toe.

“Shit!” I cursed under my breath, closing my eyes a moment to let the pain soak in, before opening them again and sending Mom a glare over my shoulder. “You know, Mom, you could help me.”

Mom rolled her eyes. “You’re an adult, Craig,” was all she said as an excuse. “You should be learning how to do things on your own.”

“Yeah, well, last I checked, lugging all of my shit up three flights of stairs isn't exactly a character-building activity,” I mumbled, purposefully forcing my ever-monotone voice to stay void of any emotion. “And if this whole ‘moving into my new college dorm room’ thing is so boring and useless to you, why are you still here?”

I expected an immediate sarcastic rebuttal, but all I got was silence for a few, long moments, before Mom said, “I know I don’t say this often, Craig, but you _are_ my son. I do love you. And it’s going to be a . . . _weird_ adjustment having one of my children suddenly not there to . . .” She cleared her throat. “Not there to antagonize.

“Now,” Mom continued, as if she hadn't actually just said something even remotely motherly, “Don’t you have a roommate waiting for you or something?”

I took the abrupt subject change for what it was. “I guess so,” I responded, awkwardly trying to collect all my belongings into my arms and kept trudging forward. I thanked whatever god was real that that bag didn’t fall all the way down the stairs. I think I would have lost my shit for real. I mean, it was oddly stressful enough moving out of what I considered my ‘boring zone.’ I didn't like excitement. It blows. I grew up in a small hick town in Colorado, where everything was exciting, and it fucking sucked. Everybody there was crazy. The one cop we had couldn't read. I only ever had two teachers, and one of them talked more about his, and sometimes her, sex life than he, sometimes she, actually taught us anything related to school. I wish I was fucking joking. I was as stoked as I was capable of being to leave that hellhole when I was a freshman in high school. I mean, abandoning my friends was kinda hard, but I figured that after high school we’d all go our separate ways and only communicate during reunions, anyway, if I even went to them. Because, as much as we’d all try to stay friends, it would never work. We’d always be too busy, or whatever. So, I just saw it as prematurely ripping off the bandaid. And it honestly wasn't as painful as all my friends made it seem like it’d be.

Mom interrupted my thoughts. “What’s his name again?” she asked, clearly just trying to keep conversation going before her _precious baby Craig_ left the nest for good. Or, at least until Christmas break.

I didn’t know the answer to her question, and told her as much.

“Will I get to meet him?” she asked.

I didn’t know the answer to her question, and told her as much.

“Do you think he’ll be crazy, and go through your stuff when you’re not in, and watch you when you sleep, and -”

“Dammit, Mom,” I said furrowing my eyebrows. We’d finally come to the top of the stairs, and I paused a moment to glare over my shoulder. “I don’t know! I have no idea what shit storm I’m about to walk into. This damn college had no single-dorms left, so I’m forced to share a room with a stranger, and I refuse to think anything about it.”

“Oh, Craig,” Mom said, holding back a laugh. “I honestly couldn’t have asked for a better son.”

My face lost all expression at the fact that she was bringing up _emotions_ again. I hated emotion. “Are you serious? Have you forgotten how many times you've had to sign detention slips, and pick me up from the police station? All my teachers hated me, and I was pretty much always home.”

“And despite all that, you've never shown that you care about anything,” Mom said. “I’d take an iron-hearted delinquent over a crybaby, sensitive little bitch any day.”

I was pretty sure I should’ve been insulted. I mean, not every mother calls their son an iron-hearted delinquent, and I assure you, I’m not iron-hearted. I was definitely a delinquent, no question, but it’s not like I never had any emotion at all. I just never let anyone see me happy, or sad, or jealous, or satisfied, or nervous, or anxious, or pleased. They’d get to see my angry side, my annoyed side, my homicidal side, and my I-don’t-give-a-shit side daily, but that’s about it. So, yeah, I guess I agreed with my mom. I would've hated myself had I been a crybaby, sensitive little bitch.

“Yeah, well, thanks I guess,” I said, coming to a stop in front of a door with a black plaque with the number ‘374’ on it. I let everything in my arms drop the floor. Fuck holding shit, my biceps were aching. “Well, this is it. My future as a college student awaits.”

Mom didn’t do anything for what was probably a good, solid minute. She just stood there awkwardly, glancing at me every once in awhile. Finally, she took pity and said, “I hope you’re not waiting for a hug.”

I rolled my eyes. “No.”

She cleared her throat. “Good. Well, I guess I should be going. Your dad’s at work, so I have to pick Tricia up from soccer practice. Are you, uh . . . going to be good by yourself?”

“Mom, I’ll be fine,” I told her, in as comforting a voice as I could. Which wasn't very comforting, because I didn’t really have an overly-sensitive bone in my body to handle uncomfortably emotional situations. “I’m supposed to be doing shit on my own, right? So, I got it. I did all this without help,” I added, gesturing to the mess of bags on the floor. “I think I can take it from here.”

“Oh. Uh, okay.” She didn’t leave right away like I thought she would. Instead, she shrouded the two of us in more awkward silence.

“Mom?”

“Hmm?”

“. . . You’re still here.”

“Well, I thought you should know that I’ll be here tomorrow with a surprise for you. I wanted you to be acquainted with your roommate first.”

I closed my eyes and let out a breath. “This ‘surprise’ better not be condoms, because if it is, you can forget about it.” Mom had this stupid theory that I was gay, even though I’d cleared it up _many_ times, and told her I was _straight_.

Mom laughed a rare, genuine laugh that I didn’t hear very often. “No. I think you’ll like it much better.”

I rolled my eyes. “Good. Now, kindly go home. If I’m going to see you tomorrow, then this doesn't have to be some bullshit, teary goodbye ceremony that will mean nothing because I’ll be home at Christmas.”

Mom gave me the finger, which was a gesture I readily returned.

I managed to get Mom to leave, but not without a surprisingly serious fight, and the second she did, I grabbed the key from my pocket, unlocked the door, and swung it open. The moment I opened the door, I was hit with the thick scent of strong coffee. On instinct, my nose scrunched up. I despised the very _idea_ of coffee ever since I was dared to drink an entire pot, without cream or sugar, when my old friends and I were thirteen. It fucked up my stomach, and I swore myself off the stuff the second I stopped barfing.

 _Fucking fantastic_ , I thought bitterly, dropping everything on the floor again. _I was lucky enough to land a roommate that drinks enough coffee, that he decided to use the one electrical appliance each occupant is allowed to bring his own coffee maker. Not a mini fridge. Not a TV. Not even a microwave or whatever. But a fucking coffee maker. Isn't this fucking. Fantastic_. As I concluded my pessimistic rant, I scanned the room for a sign of the asshole, but the room was completely empty. As in, he’d already moved in and everything, but there was absolutely no human being in sight.

“Hello?” I asked in that voice I used whenever I wanted someone to know I didn’t care about them. “Someone in here?”

I heard a muffled squeak coming from _somewhere_ , and my first thought was, _Oh, fucking fantastic for a third time. Not only is my roommate an avid coffee drinker, but this building has rats, too_. . .

With an irritated sigh, I kicked the door shut with my foot, and then kicked my bags across the room one by one to the bed that hadn't already been taken.

It was only then, as I strode across the room to join my belongings, that I noticed a head of blonde hair peeking out from under the other bed. And with that head of blonde hair came the trembling face and wide eyes of what I assumed was my roommate.

. . . Yes. My roommate was hiding under his bed, and probably had been ever since he’d heard me coming. And he looked _terrified_. And not terrified in the metaphorical sense, like how some people claim they’re ‘terrified’ about meeting new people, but he looked genuinely scared that I’d be a serial killer, or a rapist or something. As soon as we made eye contact, he moved further under the bed, let out this awful sound, and said,

“GAH! You’re . . . are you Craig Tucker?”

I raised an eyebrow. He reminded me instantly of a chipmunk. “Um . . . yeah,” I said slowly, taking in what little of him that I could see. He was twitching like a methhead, and, if either one of us should’ve been freaked out by the other, I’m pretty sure I’d be the scared one. “I’m your roommate.” I felt the need to tell him. “And, uh . . . what’s your name again?”

“Tweek . . . Tweek Tweak,” he said in a high-pitched voice. “I’m your roommate.”

“I gathered that,” I said, giving him a leveled look. I had very little sympathy, or empathy or whatever, for him. At the time, I didn’t really respect people who showed their emotions so openly. Sure, I got being scared of new situations. Hell, I was more nervous about leaving home than I’ll ever admit to anybody, but Tweek was looking at me like I was some psychopathic freak that cared nothing about human suffering. “And I also gathered that you like coffee.”

He nodded more than was necessary. “Yeah . . . It’s the only thing that calms me down,” he explained hesitantly, like I was going to care enough about that information to use it against him. “Does it . . . bother you?” As soon as he said this this, he scrambled out from under the bed and spoke faster than I've ever heard a human speak before. “I’m sorry, but I've just been drinking coffee since I was seven, and . . . and I don’t know if I can just stop right away . . . I can _try_ to drink it outside, but sometimes I can’t sleep, and then I just . . . I just _need_ to drink coffee, man, and I've never been told I can’t ever drink coffee, but what if I fall asleep at night, and I just keep sleeping over my alarm, or someone kidnaps me, and I’m too busy being not awake to stop them . . .

“But what if you put poison in my coffee! That’ll kill me! GAH!” He began pretty much hyperventilating, and wringing his hands like I was holding him at gunpoint to explain his apparent coffee obsession. “Oh, God, oh, Jesus, I can’t die here! I’ll never get to see my parents again! And I have friends back at home, a job, and my _parents_ -”

“ _Dude_ ,” I interrupted, feeling extremely weirded out and just a little uneasy at how jittery and paranoid he was acting. How on _earth_ he was accepted into any college at all was a miracle. “I can deal with it as long as you don’t tie me to a chair and force-make me drink it. But seriously . . . I’m not going to hurt you, or whatever you’re thinking right now. Just don’t annoy me too much, and I’ll have no reason to even _want_ to kill you to begin with.”

Apparently, this wasn't the _best_ thing to say, because he began jittering even more, and pacing around the room in erratic circles. “Oh, you _are_ going to kill me! Oh, _God_ -”

“Tweek, I’m not going to kill you,” I said, forcing my voice into that weird soft comforting tone that I hated using. But, I figured if we were going to live together, we’d have to like each other, or at least tolerate each other’s existence, so I tried to be as pleasant as possible. “I was just joking.” I wasn't, but he didn’t need to know that. “So, just . . . calm down. Breath. Close your eyes and count to ten. Stay positive. Uh . . . stop and smell the roses. Don’t judge a book by it’s cover. That one’s a good one. Um . . . let’s see, what else . . . Oh! You’re good enough. You’re smart enough. And doggone it, people like you.” I ran out of reassurances, or really just somewhat-relevant quotes that might help him, so I just pulled a quote from some random skit from Saturday Night Live back in the early 90’s. I only knew about it because one of my friends from high school, (or . . . well, I guess _technically_ we were friends), was big into hippy bullshit, and he actually took that pretentious bastard, (fucking _fictional_ ), Stuart Smalley seriously.

Something about what I said made Tweek stop shaking so much, and he gave me a weird look. "Stuart Smalley? You know he’s not real?”

I blinked at him. Not only was I surprised he knew who the hell Stuart Smalley was to begin with, but I was a little insulted that he thought I was stupid enough to think he was an actual _person_. “Yeah. I know.”

“My parents used to make me listen to him when I was - GAH! - a kid,” he explained. He seemed to be calming down a little bit. I guess my gruff comforting voice did something to him, because he walked over to his bedside table, grabbed a huge mug, and took a long swallow out of the steaming liquid from inside. And when I say steaming liquid, I mean I could _see_ the steam. It was a few degrees short from boiling, and yet he just gulped it down like it was room-temperature water or something. I quickly realized he was the weirdest person I’d ever met, and I wasn't too sure I liked him. But no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t look away from his shaking face, and how his head would suddenly jerk to the side.

Because he was so distracted by his coffee, I took the time to really look at him. His hair was disheveled, and so blonde it was pretty much sunshine yellow. He clearly hadn't brushed it that morning. Or that week. Hell, maybe that entire month. I figured it was a pretty logical assessment that he didn’t sleep much. The bags under his eyes were packed for a Christmas trip to Hawaii, and were all purple and bruised. He was pale. Really pale. He probably hadn't ever seen sunlight before. His clothes weren't even close to being neat; his faded green, way-too-big shirt wasn't buttoned properly, the sleeves hilariously too long, and several stains covered the entire front. Coffee. Yeah. Definitely coffee. His pants were a dark blue, and probably the only more-or-less organized part about his entire appearance. The knees weren't ripped, no visible stains, and they even look like they were ironed.

“Uh . . . Craig?”

I blinked a few times, before realizing that I'd just been caught staring. I felt a blush rise to my cheeks, but I mentally told it to go away, and thankfully my Tucker genes kicked in, and I gave him my typical bored look and shrugged. “Sorry,” I said, and even I could hear the lack of sorry in my voice. I turned away, trying to distract myself by sifting through one of the ungodly amount of bags that I'd brought, but I was really stuck on the fact that I was . . . oddly intrigued by my mess of a roommate.

It was nothing more than intrigue, though. Mere fascination at how different he was. How neurotic and delusional he was. How truly petrified he was of me.

But there was something about the twitchy little freak. I just couldn’t put my finger on it.


	2. The Magical Healing of Stuart Smalley

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (So I periodically skim through all of the chapters to make sure everything's consistent as I move forward, and for some reason I've just noticed that a guy that is 5 and a half feet tall cannot weigh 100 pounds without pretty much being on his death bed. So I changed that, and I can't believe it took me that long to sort that out.)

It took me all of fifteen minutes to get everything situated in just the way I liked it. It probably would've taken me less time had my roommate been anyone _other_ than Tweek, who was huddled in a corner, with his mug of coffee clutched in his twitchy hands. Being in the same room as him made me feel a little uneasy, and a very large part of me wanted to just leave. But the thing is, I never went anywhere. My preferred place on earth was inside a room, by myself. Maybe with someone I actually liked, but I was new to the area, and there was no way in _hell_ I was going to leave. So I stayed. Whether that was a good decision or not . . . well, I figured I’d find out eventually.

After I finished making my bed, I plopped on the covers, partially skewing the comforter, but I didn’t care enough to move. I pressed my back against the wall, hugging my knees to my chest, and carefully observed the guy opposite me. He really was helpless looking. Hell, he’d probably lose a fight against a ten-year-old girl who had one arm tied behind her back. He was that frail. I couldn’t picture him participating in any act of violence. It just didn’t seem like it fit him. If something were to attack him, he’d probably just cower and hide, instead of actually trying to defend himself.

I guess I gazed at him for too long, because, without prompt, he lifted his head and looked at me. But it was more than just looking; his hazel eyes were boring into my face, and, if I hadn't found the room tense already, I definitely did after he went ahead and pulled that one.

After a few very awkward moments of staring each other, I cleared my throat and looked away. “So, where are you from?”

“AUGH!” If I was that crybaby sensitive little bitch that Mom declared I wasn't, I would've flinched at the sudden screech. But I wasn't, so I just sat there and waited for him to answer. “I’m from Denver.”

I almost smiled. We actually had something in common, even though it was virtually meaningless. “Colorado, huh? Yeah, I’m from Colorado, too. But I’m from a tiny redneck town called South Park.”

“I've heard of that place,” he said, his vibrating eyes drifting somewhere above my shoulders. “Some people from there wanted to kill Terrance and Phillip a few years ago.”

That actually made me grin. As much as I hated Stan, Kyle, Kenny, and Cartman, saving Terrance and Phillip was actually pretty fun. Sure, it _was_ their fault that the two funniest Canadians were almost executed, but it was a fun weekend anyway.

“Yeah. I was there when it happened. Me and some friends helped stop it.” I paused thoughtfully. “Well, like three of them were my friends. I hated everybody else.”

“You hate everybody?” he asked curiously, his originally shrill voice deepening slightly. “Really _everybody_?”

I shrugged. Most of the people I’d met up until that point knew pointedly that I was the most cynical bastard to walk the earth, but I guess getting to know me and realizing that I’m an asshole was too much for some people to handle. Especially Tweek, who was so innocent and surprised looking, my heart stuttered. _What’s he all sad about?_ I thought with a frown. _I never said I hated_ him. “Yeah. Most people piss me off.”

Tweek was practically hyperventilating at that. “AUGH! Do I piss you off?”

I wasn't sure how he expected me to respond to that, because I definitely wasn't going to _tell_ him he pissed me off. I didn’t even know him well enough to say that he always pissed me off, or if he was just acting like that because he wasn't good with new people. So, I decided that being honest is the best fucking policy, and I shrugged, saying, “I don’t know yet. I met you like fifteen minutes ago.”

Tweek looked away awkwardly, his eyebrows furrowing in whatever the hell he was thinking about. We sat in silence for a few agonizing minutes, before I just rolled my eyes, and leaned forward, grabbing my laptop from my open backpack beside my bed. Thank God for electronics to block out the world around you. And also thank God that Tweek took the hint.

I had arrived at the dorm at about 4:30, and by 6:00, after I’d eaten the PB&J I put in my backpack, I’d pretty much forgotten Tweek’s existence. He’d actually grown quiet. Well, not really all that quiet. I just put headphones on to drown out the constant noise he was making. I did glance over at him a little after 8:00, and he was sitting on his bed, holding a mug of coffee in one hand, and drawing something in a notebook on his lap. I shrugged, and turned away. 

* * *

Later that night, (like _really_ later that night, they sun must’ve set hours ago), I finally decided it’d probably be best to go to sleep. I was about three seconds away from actually being asleep, when a loud noise from the other side of the room interrupted it.

“GAH! EHH! Oh Jesus!”

I bolted upright, my heart beating a fucking marathon as I stared at Tweek in surprise. He was sitting hunched over in his bed, his knees up to his chest and his arms wrapped around his legs, and, from what little light the moon provided, he looked absolutely petrified. Again. I was beginning to think he was in a constant state of panic.

“Tweek? What’s wrong?” I asked, my voice gravelly and annoyed. But, even though I was pretty sure there was nothing dangerous going on, suddenly screeching like that in the middle of the night . . . well, I found myself feeling strangely worried about him. But, worried in the way that an older brother worries about their younger brother. Or not even that, but like how a stranger on the street gets worried when another stranger on the street suddenly has a heart attack. You know. It wasn't personal or anything.

“AHH!” he screamed, actually physically jumping at the sound of my voice, and he turned his head to look at me. “Craig!”

I raised an eyebrow. “Yeah?”

“You . . . aren't you scared?” he asked loudly, burying his face in between his knees.

“No?”

His words came quick and muffled. “But . . . but you’re so far away from home, and your family, in a place that you've never been before, in a room with someone you've never _met_ before, and anything could happen, something _bad_ could happen -”

 _Goddamn that guy can talk fast_ , I thought, absorbing his panic in my still pretty asleep state. I ran a hand down my face and interrupted him. “Nothing bad is going to happen, Tweek.”

“Yes it will!” he exclaimed, his head snapping up and he stared at me with saucer-like eyes.

 _Holy shit_ , I thought, my heart skipping a beat at the look on his face. _This guy’s got an anxiety disorder from_ hell. “No, it won’t. Just calm down, and think about this situation from a logical standpoint.” The expression on his face didn’t change, so I continued. “I mean, what are the odds that someone will break into our room, on this particular day, with the intent to hurt you?”

He hesitated, and I took that as a good thing. “Not very high -”

“That’s right,” I said with a nod. “Not very high -”

“ _But it’s still there, Craig_!” he exclaimed, his head jerking to the side violently. “And I can’t do anything to protect myself! I’m only five-and-a-half feet tall! I only weigh 118 pounds! What could _I_ do?”

I sighed. “Just . . . Wait a second, 118 pounds?” _Jesus Christ, he’s like air_.

_“Craig!”_

“Alright, alright, calm down.” I wracked my brain, trying to remember any hints he might’ve dropped about what calms him down. The only thing I could think about was the fact that his parents made him watch Stuart Smalley when he was a kid, so that dumb guy had to’ve had a positive impact on him. “Okay, Tweek. You’re good enough. You’re smart enough. And doggone it -”

“People like me,” Tweek finished, still shaking uncontrollably, but beginning to take calming breaths. “I’m good enough. I’m smart enough. And doggone it, people like me. I’m good enough. I’m smart enough. And doggone it, people like me. I’m good enough. I’m smart enough. And doggone it -”

I stopped listening at that point. All I know is he must’ve said it five, six, ten more times, before he fell silent. I let myself fall back onto my bed, and my eyes began to shut, when I heard Tweek shift off of his bed, and his bare feet landed on the hardwood floor with a soft padding noise. I looked over at him, and my eyes widened as I watched him do the one thing I really wasn't expecting, but probably should have been.

“You’re really having coffee?” I asked incredulously. “It’s . . .” I glanced at my alarm clock on my bedside table, and my eyes widened at the sight. “It’s three in the fucking morning! Why the fuck are you drinking coffee?”

“Can’t sleep,” was all he said, his voice jerky and panicked.

“Well, _that’s_ the problem, Tweek!” I said, a bit louder than I normally spoke. But, seriously, who doesn't get worried about a grown man that forces himself to stay awake because he gets scared? There _must’ve_ been something wrong with him. “You’re drinking coffee at _three in the morning_! Don’t you think there’s something _wrong_ with that picture?”

Tweek was trembling as he stared mindlessly at the dripping of the coffee into his coffee mug. “No, Craig. No, I can’t sleep. They’ll get me if I sleep!”

I rubbed my temples. _Fuck, this guy_ can’t _be fucking serious_ , I thought, exasperated. But, I figured humoring him would be better than crushing his delusions by _telling_ him that he was being fucking delusional. “Who’ll get you if you sleep?”

“I . . . I don’t know! Someone!” he exclaimed, his fingers twiddling together. He leaned forward towards the coffee maker, as if he thought watching it more closely would make the caffeine brew faster. “I’m not used to this room! I’m not used to you! I’m hundreds of miles from home! What if someone comes in and tries to kill me! What if _you_ try to kill me! NGH! No way, man, this is _way_ too much pressure -”

“Tweek, calm down,” I ordered firmly. Jesus Christ, I just wanted to sleep . . . “You’re going to pass out if you don’t breath.” I waited until the noises of panic dropped to just high-pitched whimpers. “Now, listen to me for a second. No one’s going to come in here and try to kill you. The door is locked, the window is locked, and we’re on the third floor. Stop worrying about nothing. And I promise you, I don’t want to kill you. I find you too harmless and helpless to even hate, which is surprising, because you know I hate everyone.” Part of me was actually shocked that those words had left my mouth, because I didn’t even know I felt that way until that very moment. A part of me wanted to analyze the involuntary thought, but another part of me, (the part that doesn't care about shit and focuses entirely on food, sleep, and pissing), found sleep much too attractive, so I ignored the confusion for the time being. “So if anything bad _does_ happen, I’ll make sure neither of us die, or get kidnapped, or whatever else you’re thinking about. Okay? Are you okay now?”

Tweek’s voice was small and quiet as he nodded slowly. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m okay now.”

“Good. And you can’t drink coffee this late, you'll fry your brain.” _Wait . . . what the fuck?_ I thought, furrowing my eyebrows. Words were just escaping my mouth without my consent, and it was starting to piss me off. Usually I was so in control of everything that I did, because, even though I didn’t fucking care about the consequences, I did hold some standards for myself. However, I was, for some reason, actually projecting something that resembled _worry_. But I wasn't worried. I just really didn’t like the smell of coffee, and I refused to fall asleep with burning beans invading my nostrils. I told him that in as indifferent a voice as I could muster, and then laid back against my pillows and offered him a glare that I’m not sure registered with him in the lack of lighting. “Now go to sleep.”

Tweek paused a moment, and I watched as he looked between me and the coffee maker, as if it were a difficult choice. As far as I was concerned, sleep was better than coffee by a clear mile. And finally, he seemed to have made the right choice, because he let out a deep, ragged sigh and reclined back on his own bed, his back facing me, and his trembling fingers wrapping his blanket around his trembling body. “Okay,” he said, volume hardly above a whisper.

I turned my back on him, deciding that I’d done all I could do to make him ‘feel better’, and my final thought before I dropped off was, _This is going to be the longest year of my entire life._


	3. I Watch Red Racer, Too

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things will pick up after this chapter, I promise!

Fucking Tweek.

That little asshole woke me up at six o’clock when his alarm, (that was appropriately tuned to the sound of a nuclear alarm blaring loud enough to wake Russia), went off. Never before had I ever been brought out of consciousness faster than that morning. I felt like I’d been electrocuted, and when I finally realized that the United States _wasn’t_ under attack, I glared over at my roommate, who was obliviously standing by his coffee maker, shaking horrifically and muttering probably nonsense under his breath.

I felt briefly homicidal.

“Tweek, what the _fuck_ _?”_ I asked, dropping my aching head into my hands and rubbing painfully at my eyes. I was starting to get that piercing headache behind the eyes that you get when you don't get enough sleep, and I was already pissed beyond belief. 

I heard Tweek squeal loudly, as if he didn’t expect me to wake up and be pissed that his alarm was fucking terrifying. _No wonder he’s on edge all the goddamn time_ , I thought bitterly. _If I woke up to that every morning, I’d be paranoid about literally everything around me, too_.

“ _I don’t know you!"_ he screamed, jumping back and covering his face with his arms. I didn’t even know what to say to that, so I just sat there, waiting for him to realize that he had a _roommate_ , that’d he _met_ before, that was _seriously_ pissed off at him.

After a few seconds, he slowly lowered his arms, and the terror that had been on his face before subsided slightly, and I could tell he was starting to recognize me. “Oh . . . ‘morning, Craig.”

I frowned at him. “Yeah. Morning. Now let’s get something straight. I am _not_ waking up to that every morning. I’m pretty sure I just had a heart attack.”

Tweek averted his eyes, and pulled at his mis-buttoned pajama shirt nervously. “I’ll sleep through my alarm if it’s any quieter,” he said meekly, staring fixedly, with tired eyes, at the slow drip of his coffee maker.

“That’s not a very good explanation,” I observed flatly, falling back onto my pillow. “Because it doesn’t explain _why_ the fucking hell you’re awake so early.”

There was a few uncomfortably long moments of silence before Tweek finally fucking answered me. “My . . . I used to work for my parents at their coffee shop,” I rolled my eyes, because of _course_ the coffee psycho would work at a coffee shop, “and sometimes they had me open the store for them. We opened at five o’clock, and I had to be there half an hour early to get everything set up. I . . . I’m just used to waking up early.”

I vaguely felt sorry for him, that his parents made him work such fucking insane hours, but, at the same time, I was pissed off that I was running on three hours of sleep, and I had no interest in offering him . . . comfort, or something stupid like that. “That’s fantastic,” I said, deadpanned, turning on my side away from him. “But _I’m_ not used to waking up early. So from now on, shut your fucking alarm off, and _I’ll_ wake you up in the morning. When _I_ get up.” I burrowed deep into the hard mattress, savoring how warm it was, and basking in the fact that I didn’t have any responsibilities that day, except for being awake when my mom showed up. “You could use the sleep anyway. Fucking three hours,” I scoffed, my words turning into incoherent mumbles. The last thing I remembered saying was, “No wonder you’re such a fucking spaz.”

* * *

I woke up again at eleven o’clock when I felt something hit me square in the face. I jolted awake -- _again_ , for the _second_ time that day -- and when I looked around the room, I saw Tweek, ( _fucking Tweek_ ), under his bed, his eyes wide, his entire body trembling uncontrollably. He had a pillow clutched to his chest, and it was then that I realized that the slight weight on my lap was his other pillow that he’d thrown at me. I squeezed my eyes shut, reclining back on my elbows and tried to count to ten so I wouldn’t lose my shit.

“Tweek,” I said quietly, after I decided I was calm enough not to slap the anxiety off his face. “What. The fuck. Was that?”

“GAH!” he squealed, pressed so far under the bed the shadows almost completely hid his face. “EHH! Someone’s at the door! It could be a - _NGH_ \- a serial killer who wants to kill me! Or a _rapist_! Oh, God, oh, Jesus, please don’t let it be a rapist!”

I rolled my eyes, and threw my blankets from my body, watching indifferently as they pooled on the floor. “That’s probably my mom. She said she was stopping by today to drop something off for me.” I didn’t look to see if this made him feel better, because I really wanted a break from all that alone time with my weird new roommate. Tweek was way too . . . out there for my taste. My mom was just the right amount of Tucker for me.

When I opened the door, Mom was standing there with a huge box in her arms, her purse loosely hanging from her shoulder. She didn’t smile at me, and I didn’t smile at her.

“Hi,” she said simply. “I brought your surprise with me.”

“I see that,” I answered, glancing down curiously at the box. “What is it?”

“Let me in, and maybe I’ll show you,” she said, looking over my shoulder. “And hurry up, this box is heavy.”

“Charming, Mom,” I said, stepping aside and allowing her to pass me. I would’ve offered to help her, but memories of her making me carry every single bag of mine upstairs by myself hit me, and I figured she could make another few steps.

“I told you you had to learn to do things on your own when you become an adult, Craig,” Mom said, blowing a strand of hair out of her eyes and lowering the box onto the floor. Whatever the fuck was in it must’ve been really fucking fragile, because the box had been on the floor for a solid five seconds before she straightened up again, like she was worried that dropping it even the smallest bit would damage it.

I stared at her. “Are you sure you can trust me with whatever the hell that is?”

She rolled her eyes. “No. But I’m going to anyway.” She gestured to the box and added, “Your father and I got you a new TV.”

I gawked at her. When she told me she had a ‘surprise’ for me the day before, I thought she’d like . . . bake me a cake or something. And, sure, once I saw the box, I knew whatever it was must’ve been way more important than a cake, but I didn’t know she went out and fucking bought me a new TV! I didn’t even know what to say to her, and I guess she realized that, because she cleared her throat and said,

“Surprise,”

in the most bored voice I knew she was capable of. This meant more to her than she was letting on, and, to be honest, it meant . . . a little bit more than a normal act of kindness to me, too.

“Oh, and I brought the old DVD player we had lying around in the basement. I brought your Red Racer . . . thing,” she said awkwardly, pulling a box set from the purse that was draped over her shoulder. She held a hand out, presenting me with one of my most prized possession: the complete Red Racer television show on DVD. It was one of three things of actual value that I ever bought for myself in my entire life. Red Racer, one of my guinea pigs, Stripe #4, and a fucking sweet Nikon camera that Cartman stole, broke, and gave back in a care package with a card that said ‘Sorry’ in red crayon. All the other stuff I bought was, like, weed and booze and clothes and shit. But that Red Racer DVD collection . . . I watched it so many times, I could recite some of the dialogue to my favorite episodes. I _cared_ enough to remember some of the dialogue to Red Racer. That alone should tell you _something_ about me.

I smiled at her, and took the box set from her outstretched hand. “Thanks, Mom.”

She smiled back at me, and I took a moment to really appreciate the moment. You know. Mom actually knew what I was interested in enough to know I’d miss it after I’d left. And I probably would’ve continued a conversation with her, when I heard Tweek’s little grunts and whimpers and I sighed, rolling my eyes and gripping my Red Racer box set in my fingers. I’d happily forgotten about him for a few blessed seconds there.

Mom quirked her eyebrows, and she looked at me in confusion. “What was that?”

I shook my head. “That was my roommate, Tweek.”

Her expression didn’t change. “Where is he?”

“He’s under his bed.”

Mom craned her neck around me, trying to see where he was, but, from what little I knew about Tweek, I knew he was as far away from the doorway as possible, even though I knew he could hear the both of us talking and knew my mom wasn’t a serial killer, or a rapist. He probably just didn’t want to meet any new people, if he could help it. Which, in a rare moment of solidarity, I understood. Mom clearly didn’t see him, because she turned back to me, her eyebrow still raised, and asked, “Why?” in a voice that suggested she didn’t give a fuck if he heard her or not.

“Because he’s scared of meeting new people.” I paused, before adding, “It’s best if you just leave him alone.”

She cleared her throat. “Oh. Um.” She adjusted her purse on her shoulder and averted her eyes. “Well. I guess I should leave so you can get everything set up.”

I shrugged. “I guess so.”

And then Mom was just fucking staring at me, like she had been the day before, and I started squirming under her eyes. “Mom, what? Is there something on my face?”

Without even saying anything, Mom just grabbed onto my wrist, fucking _dragged_ me into the hallway, and closed the door behind us. I stumbled, adjusting to my abrupt new surroundings, before glaring at her. “What -”

“I’m going to miss you.”

Well, that shut me the fuck up. I mean, I knew Mom was going to miss me at least a little bit; I’m her son, what parent doesn’t get at least a little sad when their kid leaves the house for pretty much good? But I just thought she’d keep that thought to herself, like she did with every other maternal thought I knew she had that she didn’t share. I knew my mom loved me. I knew she cared about me. But I never needed her to tell me, and I never thought she ever _would_ tell me. At least, not over something that didn’t involve inevitable death.

I blinked slowly at her. “Yeah. I’m . . . going to miss you, too.”

She nodded, wrapping an arm somewhat-gracefully around my shoulders and patting me gently. “Is now a good time for a teary, bullshit goodbye ceremony?” she asked quietly, resting her head on one of my shoulders. I had gotten taller than her over the years, and, between my parents, I was a pretty even build across the board. I was really fucking tall like my Dad, (I was like, 6’4’’), with huge hands and broad shoulders. But I also had a pretty thin waist, and girly legs, and a neck that I was _told_ was an average length, but I always felt like it was longer than it should’ve been.

But, anyway, enough about my average appearance. Back to the hallway. That hug between Mom and me was probably the most intimate mother-son moment we’d ever had ever, and I wasn’t sure how to feel about it. On the one hand, I appreciated the sentiment, and the fact that mushy, emotional bullshit situations didn’t happen between us often, so when they did, I let them happen. But, also, I’d never maintained physical contact with anybody for that long, _ever_ , so it didn’t take long for me to get a little squirmy.

 _Aw, what the fuck_ , I thought dismissively, bringing my arms around her thinner body and laying my cheek on top of her head. I wasn’t about to let her embarrass herself alone. “You can try it, I guess,” I answered her, drawing random patterns on her waist. “I can’t guarantee how long I’ll stick around for it. You get bonus points if you tell me I’m cooler than Tricia.”

Mom laughed. “Just because you’re leaving the house, and because she’s not here, I’ll tell you you’re cooler than Tricia.”

I grinned. “Sweet.”

For a mother and a son, who’d known each other for just over eighteen years, we really should’ve had more to talk about, but we just fell into our normal silence and just held onto each other.

A couple minutes later, Mom straightened up, let me go, and took a step back. Our goodbyes were pretty straightforward; pretty much just, “‘Bye,” followed by our respective names, and a fond middle finger exchange. When I went back into the dorm room, Tweek was standing in the center of the room, his hands gripping his shirt front and one eye squeezed shut in . . . concentration? I didn’t know; up until that point, I had never seen that expression before.

After a beat of silence he said, “You -- NGH! -- watch Red Racer?”

I raised an eyebrow at him, intrigued by the meek, curious tone of his voice. “Yeah. Why?”

“Oh, well . . . it’s just Red Racer is a kid’s show, and -”

I frowned at that, ready on the defense if he said anything against my favorite show of all time. “And what?”

“No, I don’t mean anything bad,” he said hurriedly, gripping the front of his shirt and tugging roughly. How those buttons held was a miracle I’d never understand. “I watch it, too. I don’t know anyone else my age who does. I was always embarrassed by it.”

I blinked. I probably shouldn’t have been surprised that he watched a kids show; he was the biggest man child I’d ever met. And I was only mildly surprised by what he said next.

“Can I maybe watch it with you?”

I shrugged. “Well, _I’m_ going to watch it, and since you’re in the same room as me, I guess you can. But if you talk, or make your twitchy sounds at all, while it’s on, I’m kicking you out.”

He nodded, but didn’t look offended. “Red Racer always calmed me down when I was a kid. I’d probably be quieter with it on than with it off.”

I nodded, but didn’t say anything, ‘cause I was satisfied with his answer. Guess it was just another weird thing that made the hyperactive manchild chill out.

While I was busy setting up the TV and DVD player, Tweek was busy doing something or other behind me. I didn’t deem whatever that something was important enough to turn around to see, but once I’d finished putting everything together, (which took about fifteen minutes), I turned around to tell him that everything was ready. I was shocked to see what he’d done.

He managed to build this incredible fort that looked _extremely_ professional, and the kid inside me that still liked Red Racer, and ate popcorn kernels like they were regularly popped popcorn, was in awe. “Dude . . .” was all I said, taking in the sight: our mattresses had been taken from their frames and placed next to each other to create this enormous cushion, he had moved the bedside table, and his coffee table he’d brought with him, to use as supports for this canopy-thing that covered said enormous cushion. I’d never seen something that sweet for a simple Red Racer viewing.

Tweek shrugged and twitched at the same time. “NGH! I like building stuff.”

 _An engineering major?_ I thought, assuming that was what he aiming for. It was _also_ something I was not expecting. I hadn’t thought much about what he’d be studying, but, given who he was, anything would have made equally no sense.

“Oh,” I said simply. “Well . . . cool. That looks really good.” I didn’t ever compliment people ever, and I was a little bit disturbed by how quickly I was warming up to the kid, but he deserved it. It was the sweetest thing I’d ever seen.

And Tweek smiled at me after my compliment. I didn’t return it.

* * *

We’d been watching Red Racer for about three hours when, in between episodes, Tweek suddenly blurted out, “NGH! I’m not a spaz.”

I blinked, and turned to look at him. “Yes you are.” I paused in thought. “Who said that?”

He furrowed his eyebrows and shot me a glare. Or, what I’m assuming he _tried_ to make a glare, but he was twitching too much for it to be even remotely intimidating. “You did, this morning. When my alarm woke you up. You called me a ‘fucking spaz.’” I held back a laugh at how weird he sounded when he swore. “And I’m telling you, I’m not a spaz.” I didn’t say anything, but just raised an eyebrow at him, and I guess that set him off, because he folded his arms over his chest and said indignantly, “I’m _not_ , Craig!”

“Whatever you say,” I said, turning away from him again, and burrowing down onto the fort Tweek made. It was really comfortable.

I was just starting to enjoy the catchy theme song, when I suddenly felt a fist collide surprisingly hard into my shoulder. I flinched, and rubbed the spot that would eventually turn into a bruise, and shot a shocked glare at the unimpressed Tweek. “Dude, what the hell?”

“NGH! I said I’m not a spaz!” he insisted, and if I wasn’t so surprised by his sudden act of violence, I would’ve called him a little bitch for _sounding_ like such a little bitch.

And I tried not to gape at him, but damn, I really wasn’t expecting that. “Holy shit, dude . . .”

His glare slipped away slowly, and he blushed, averting his eyes and fiddling with the fucked-up buttons of his shirt. “Sorry . . . but I’m not a spaz.”

“Alright, Jesus Christ,” I muttered, staring at him. He looked . . . a little . . . well, not as creepy when he was embarrassed. Sure, it was nice to see that he had a spine, but there was something about the moment after his anger, when he was calm again, (or . . . as calm as he usually was), that I found almost . . . fuck, nevermind. “I’m sorry, I won’t call you a spaz again.” He nodded, satisfied, and turned back to the screen, but I felt the sudden need to mess with him, now that I knew what he looked like angry. He wasn’t _scary_ angry, not even a little bit. I knew he wouldn’t turn a knife on me or something, so, before I let him become fully immersed in the episode, I hid a rare grin and muttered, (at a volume that I _knew_ he could hear), “Even if you are one.”

He whipped his head back to look at me, his face a deep scowl, but when he saw the grin on my face, he relaxed a bit and rolled his eyes. “Don’t be an asshole, Craig.”

I laughed. Harder than I had in years. And nothing really all that funny had happened. It was just surprisingly nice to sit with him, and enjoy something that I didn’t have in common with anyone else. I was the only kid in South Park who watched and liked Red Racer. Not even my old best friend Clyde would humor me long enough to watch a single episode. And when I moved away in high school . . . fucking forget about it. You don’t tell people you just met when you’re fifteen, and the entire school is a wasp nest of the popular kids seeking victims, that you habitually watch a kids show. If I wanted to commit suicide, I would’ve done it out right. So it was nice to have met a friend --

And that is where I cut off that line of thinking, because, nope, not a friend. Tweek was _not_ a friend. He was someone I had just met, who was annoying, and spazzy, and woke me up in the worst ways possible, and who thought that any person who walked in the door was out to either kill him, or rape him.

He wasn’t a friend. Even if I . . . didn’t mind his company, and I appreciated the fact that he really did keep quiet throughout our entire viewing, (which continued on until six o’clock, when we both decided we couldn’t put off eating anymore) . . . that didn’t make us friends.

We were just roommates. Just roommates.


	4. The Gayest Thing I Can Even Think Of

The first class I ever had in college was called “World History I.”

I hated history.

Well, I guess that statement wasn’t really fair, though, because I hated everything about school. History wasn’t really anything special, but the fact that I had to be conscious before 10 am made it into this ass-raping two hour experience that just about killed me every Monday and Thursday mornings.

And, because this is the twenty-first century where social interactions are So Important, the entire first class was introductions. I learned way too much about the other people in that fucking class. For example: Daniel Smith’s mother died when he was five, and it really hurt a whole lot, and, for some reason, we were expected to care. And also, Lisa Ricardo was the editor of her high school’s newspaper, and, because that was a college history class, it was 100% relevant and necessary to mention.

But my favorite confession out of the whole fucking deal was Teresa Michaels. She had gotten an abortion the weekend before the first class. And she told us. Everybody. Holy shit, I nearly busted a lung, I was laughing so hard. And that’s rare, because I never fucking laugh, especially not in public. I got some pretty nasty glares, but seriously? This bitch just told the entire class of 50 students that she had an abortion, and she didn’t expect anybody to say anything?

Fuck college, dude, seriously.

When it was my turn, I just told them, “My name is Craig Tucker. I’m from Colorado. I like guinea pigs.” And then I sat down, and that’s all they ever learned about me. And that’s all anybody ever has to learn about me.

My dorm room was only a ten minute walk from my history class, so I was just heading outside to walk back to my room when I heard a voice that I found vaguely familiar.

“Craig?”

I blinked. It was my _first_ day of classes, and the first time I’d ever left my dorm room. Who the fuck knew who I was _already_? It wasn’t Tweek, because the voice wasn't shaking, and it was too deep and calm to be my weird-ass roommate. Before I brought myself to care that someone was talking to me, the voice, coming from somewhere behind me, said,

“ _Craig fucking Tucker_?”

Okay, at that I _had_ to figure out who the hell was talking to me. Whoever it was brought out the mother of all curse words, and you can’t just ignore that. I stopped walking, and glared at all the bustling college students, scurrying off to their classes, or to the library or some shit, trying to find one that I recognized.

“Craig, over here!”

My eyes followed the voice, and my jaw just about dropped when I saw who had been calling my name.

“Clyde?” I asked. I could hear the confusion in my voice. “Clyde Donovan?”

“Fuck yeah, dude!” the thick-haired brunette said, clapping me on the shoulder with a wide grin. “How long’s it been?”

I smiled, which seemed to catch Clyde off guard, but that was to be expected. He’d only witnessed me smile a handful of times in the many, many years he’d known me, and he never knew that I actually valued his existence enough to be even remotely happy to see him again.

Clyde was my best friend, up until the very second I left South Park for Middle Town, Nebraska. (I know. Dumb name for a town, but seriously, _South Park_ isn’t much better.) Clyde, Token, and Jimmy were my best friends, but Clyde was my _best_ friend. He and I did everything together. He was the one I missed the most after I left, but we never kept in contact. I wasn’t really sure why; we _could’ve_ , but we just . . . didn’t. One of my biggest regrets, actually, completely cutting him out of my life.

Before I answered him, I took a brief note of what he looked like, and how much he changed. His brown hair was still ‘seductively tousled,’ as he always insisted. He had dimples; I didn’t remember that from four years ago. He was grinning childishly at me. I knew he had missed me. He cried the day I left, (although, he cried about everything, so it wasn’t really all that special an occurrence in my book). He was wearing a Letterman jacket and a pair of nice jeans, clearly showing off the fact that he had been a jock in his previous school. Probably thought that’d land him some chicks or something. He was wearing black converse and looked like the most cliche teenager I’d ever seen.

I shook myself from my observing and adjusted my book bag on my shoulder, saying, “Since freshman year.”

“Dude, we need to catch up!” Clyde exclaimed. “I’m meeting some friends at a little restaurant a few minutes from here. You should come with!”

And that was how I found myself at a crappy diner, trying to ignore the aroma of coffee that seemed to be following me around everywhere I went.

Clyde had been chattering about his first class, and about how excited he was to finally get out of South Park and into the ‘real world,’ and I was only mildly interested in the constant _stuff_ he had to say. But he really grabbed my attention when he suddenly asked, his voice eager and excited, “Guess who else goes here?”

“Who?”

“Pretty much everybody!” he said, grinning. “Token’s here, and Bebe and Wendy, too! Even Stan, Kyle, Kenny, and that asshole Cartman made it in!”

I rolled my eyes. Sure, Token was one of my only real friends, and I was actually pretty excited to see him again, but I vaguely remember Bebe and Wendy. However, Jesus _Christ_ do I remember Stan, Kenny, Kyle, and Cartman. You couldn’t live in South Park with _out_ knowing who the four biggest dickholes in the universe were. They once swindled me out of $100, forced me to be in a Peruvian flute band, and got us stuck in Peru with no hope of escape. I hated them more than I’ve ever hated anybody, and I couldn’t express in words how pissed off I was that we’d be reunited, or whatever.

I guess Clyde understood my eye roll because he laughed and said, “Oh, yeah. They’re still assholes. But you won’t _believe_ what you missed after you left!”

“What did I miss?”

Clyde opened his mouth to answer, but a sudden shout interrupted him.

“ _Cartman!_ ”

Oh, man, the memories came flooding back . . . That was clearly Kyle Broflovski, the most motherly teenage boy I’d ever met in my life. He nagged everybody, he was constantly pissed off at _somebody_ , and he just couldn’t let shit go.

I let out a long, deep breath.

“What?” a really, really obnoxious voice pleasantly answered. “I don’t get why you’re being so uptight, Kahl -”

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Kyle said. “You just introduced me to your professor as your ‘favorite Jew hole,’ and yet you _expect_ me to be fine with it!”

My jaw dropped, and for a moment I completely forgot to keep my cool. I turned my head in the direction of the shouts, and I was even more astonished to see the dreaded foursome, walking towards us. They looked just about the same, I figured. I’d never really paid much attention to what they looked like to begin with, but I would’ve been able to pick them out of a crowd if I had to. Kyle was still wearing that God-awful ushanka, but he had ditched the orange coat and was instead wearing a Broncos t-shirt and a pair of jeans. His cheeks were bright red, and his face was twisted in anger. On his side was the fatass himself: Eric Cartman. He was hatless, his hair very-clearly purposefully messy, and he was wearing a massive, bright red sweatshirt that made him look like the kool-aid guy. He had a shit-eating grin on his face as he stared at Kyle. On Kyle’s other side was Stan, his black hair a little longer than I remember, and swept off to the side like it had gotten in his face one-too-many times. He was wearing a button-up shirt, and a pair of nice jeans, and he looked like he was trying to impress every single person he was anticipating meeting. And finally, on the other side of Cartman, was Kenny. Kenny didn’t have his bright orange parka anymore, so I could actually see his face, and he was . . . oddly handsome. Back when we were kids, I was constantly weirded out by how attractive he was, because he was one of the _unintentionally_ attractive people. He literally just rolled out of bed, and his hair fell in the right way, and his face’s neutral position was casual and indifferent, and the way he carried himself was just . . . I don’t fucking know, I’d always had a weird soft spot for Kenny. The whole world fucking did; it was impossible to hate that asshole.

“Well, you _are_ my favorite Jew hole,” Cartman answered, wrapping an arm around Kyle’s shoulders. “And I like people knowing that the finest piece of ass in this whole goddamn institution belongs to _me_.”

Kyle growled. “I don’t _belong_ to you, fatass.”

Cartman waved him off. “Sure you do. If you didn’t, you would’ve broken up with me years ago.”

My brain practically shut off at that. The Kyle and Cartman that _I_ remembered hated each other so much, they couldn’t have a single conversation without threatening to kill each other. Cartman actually _did_ try to kill Kyle. _More than once_. He gave the kid AIDS, for Christ’s sake! And you think that’s bad? Well . . . that’s pretty bad, but I remember this one time, Kyle actually encouraged Cartman to jump off a roof. The roof of a _two-story house_ , where he could’ve broken his neck and died! I didn’t think it was possible for two people to hate each other more than those two did.

But then Kyle actually smiled, and said, “Yeah, well. If _you_ didn’t belong to _me_ , you would’ve broken up with me years ago, too.”

“A fair point from the world’s hottest ginger Jew.”

“Jesus _Christ_ ,” Stan said, his face losing the amusement and being taken over with disgust. “You’re officially not allowed to talk to each other in my presence for the rest of the day.”

“Fucking gross, dude,” Kenny added.

“Hey, it’s Clyde!” Kyle said, pointing in our direction. They were only about ten feet away from us, loitering in the lobby, so there was no way they didn’t see me. In fact, his eyes even glided over my face, but he didn’t seem to recognize me.

“Hey, Clyde,” Stan and Kenny said at the same time as they walked towards us. They looked at me, too, but didn’t say anything.

“Who’s the asshole?” Cartman said, looking me up and down with unimpressed eyes.

I glanced over at Clyde, who was looking way too amused at the situation. “This is Craig. Craig _Tucker_.”

“No way!” Stan said, smiling at me with curious eyes. “Dude, it’s been so long! How've you been?”

I blinked at him. “Fine.” I didn’t think he ever liked me. Stan was the douchey ring-leader of _his_ gang, and I was head of my way _cooler_ gang. We were rivals. I hated him, and I thought he hated me, too. But he actually looked . . . kinda happy to see me. It was a little unnerving.

I realized a few seconds too late that common courtesy demanded I return the boring, meaningless pleasantries, so I cleared my throat and added, “Um. How about you?”

“Good, we’ve been good. Um . . .” He looked around him, as if trying to find something to talk about besides what I feared he was going to force me to talk about. Finally, his eyes landed on the arm that was wrapped around his best friend’s shoulder, and he said, “Kyle and Cartman are dating.”

“I can see that.” I was a little bit curious as to how the hell that happened, but mostly I was just surprised it had even happened in the first place. And I knew if I asked them, they’d go on this long rant that I’d get bored of five seconds in, but the question left my mouth before I was aware. “How?”

Kyle opened his mouth to answer, but Stan slapped a hand over his parted lips before he could say anything. “No!” he exclaimed, loud enough to draw considerable attention from the other people at the diner. I raised an eyebrow at the display, which Stan caught, and he sighed. “Seriously, don’t get Kyle started on that story. You’ll end up hearing all sorts of shit that you never wanted to hear. I’m not even joking, you’ll want to gouge your ears out with a steak knife.”

I hardly flinched at his wording. “I’ll take your word for it,” I said, glancing at the blushing face of Kyle and the smug smirk of Cartman. “So . . . what else is new?”

The guys all gathered around the table Clyde had picked out -- in the middle of the dining area, like a clear-jock-type would -- before Stan said, “Well, it’s not exactly new, but I’m still dating Wendy.”

 _Jesus Christ, seriously?_ I thought, fighting the urge to flip him off just on principle. (I didn't manage it, but it should be noted that I at least attempted to be polite.) Stan Marsh and Wendy Testaburger were the most on-again, off-again couple that the world has ever seen. They first got together back in third grade, but they were never dating for longer than six months, before one of them broke up with the other. And when they were together, sure, they weren’t too bad. They didn’t make out in public, or hump each other in the hallways, or anything, but they always acted like they were above and beyond everybody else. Like they were somehow the mature ones for being the first two get a girlfriend/boyfriend. Pissed me the fuck off, especially because they couldn’t seem to stay together for very long. God forbid they ever got _married_. They’d divorce each other so many times, that the state of Colorado would no longer deem their re-marriages legal. “And how many times have you and Wendy broken up since I saw you guys last?”

That comment caught Kyle’s attention, and he grinned. “ _Over_ fifteen.”

“And he’s seriously,” Cartman said, nodding in his . . . apparently, his boyfriend’s direction. “I’m surprised Wendy hasn’t dropped his ass for good. I mean, sure, Wendy’s a raging bitch on a good day, but she’s hot as shit, and is totally way out of Stan’s league.”

“Shut up, Cartman!” Stan said, his eyebrows furrowing and his cheeks turning all pink. “Wendy’s not a bitch! And if you call her that one more time, I’m _going_ to kick your ass!”

“Yeah, and if you call her _hot_ one more time, _I’m_ going to kick your ass!” Kyle interjected, his mouth twisted into a displeased frown.

Jesus Christ, the drama they managed to create for themselves never failed to amaze me. Seriously, Clyde, Token, Jimmy and I were never like that. We just played video games in Token’s room, and had pizza/movie nights every Friday, and stole Kyle’s stuff and put whatever we took in Cartman’s locker, just so we could watch them beat the shit out of each other.

Okay, so I guess maybe we had a part in why they fought so much, but, from afar, it’s way too hilarious to not watch. Up close, though, and when they’re just bickering . . . fucking obnoxious.

Cartman just rolled his eyes, tugging on one of the ear flaps of Kyle’s ushanka, which only provoked a disgruntled “ _Hey_!”, instead of the calming that I’m half-sure Cartman was looking for. “Calm down, Jew. You know she’s not my type. She’s a bit lacking in the dick department.” He turned to me, and asked, “And what about you, Tucker? Are you still a raging faggot?”

I blinked at him. Somehow, I’d forgotten that Cartman and a few other people used to assume I was gay. Which I wasn’t, and I was never sure where they got that from. I mean, I never showed any interest in other guys, I wrestled and shit as much as the other kids, and I enjoyed viewing in-class fights from the front row. I was a badass kid, if just a little boring, and I never acted gay even a _little_ bit. So I told him, my voice flat, “I’m not, nor was I ever, a raging faggot.”

I guess that was the wrong thing to say, because Cartman elbowed Kyle in the ribs and said, “He’s totally a raging faggot. He just said the word ‘nor.’ Only raging faggots say the word ‘nor.’ And besides, he was totally gay for Clyde back in elementary school.”

At that, I raised an eyebrow. I could feel Clyde’s curious eyes on me, but I was too busy being confused to respond to him. “I . . . what?”

“See, he’s not even denying it,” Cartman said with an obnoxious laugh.

“Cartman, I . . . Jesus Christ, you’re so fucking stupid . . .” I rested my chin on my palm, my elbow propped on the rickety diner table. “I never had a thing for Clyde. He was my best friend. And I’m not gay.” Before that stupid fatass could say anything, I lifted my eyebrows to Clyde and said, “So how exactly did you guys become friends? Clyde used to hate you guys when we were kids.”

“You used to hate us?” Kenny asked, his confused voice not muffled anymore by his parka. “Like, playfully hate, or I-want-to-kick-your-teeth-in hate?”

“Kick your teeth in,” I said, knowing that Clyde was too much of a peace-maker to admit to it. He was one of those ‘why-can’t-we-just-get-along’ guys, and it was my least favorite thing about him. Always had been.

“Huh,” Kyle said, as if he had just learned something new. “I thought it was just dumb kid rivalry.”

“It was,” Clyde argued, and it sounded like he meant it. “I never hated you guys. I just . . . _had_ to hate you. We were enemies. I’d be a traitor if I didn’t act like it.”

Well . . . damn, that was news to me! “Were we supposed to be faking?” I asked bluntly. “Because I wasn’t faking. I actually hated you guys. I found all of you annoying and unnecessarily involved with stupid shit that kids should stay out of.”

The table got quiet and really fucking uncomfortable.

“Um . . . oh,” Stan said awkwardly, sharing a confused glance with Kenny.

I was beginning to sense that, even though I didn’t have the energy or the cause to hate them anymore, telling someone that I had previously nurtured intense hatred for them probably wasn’t the most considerate thing to do. But, before I could mend the situation, the waitress came to take all our orders.

She was about our age, with black hair and bright blue eyes and a lip ring that she kept playing with as she wrote down our orders. Her name was . . . Melissa? Miranda? I’m pretty sure it started with an ‘m’; I forgot the second she left, but she was _really_ fucking weird. She kept staring at me, and leaned too close when I told her I wanted a short stack and some orange juice. I knew exactly what she was up to, but I pretended I didn’t, because I _really_ wasn’t interested. Nobody with piercings. It was a rule I had made for myself back in middle school. There was no real reason why I never wanted to date a person with piercings; I just always thought it was weird to punch holes into your body, and, for some, (probably fucking dumb), reason, I didn’t trust people with metal hooks through their skin. The third time she tried to lean her rack into my face, and I’d leaned away to give her more room to move, she finally took the hint that I wasn’t interested. Fucking took her long enough.

When she left, I shrugged, and continued. “If it makes you feel any better, I hated pretty much everyone. I could tolerate Kenny,” I nodded to the blonde guy, who beamed happily, “because he doesn’t bullshit anybody. I still kinda hated him, though.” He made a disappointed noise, but I ignored him. “The only people I _didn’t_ hate was Clyde, Token, and Jimmy.”

Clyde cheered, slapping me on the back and disregarding the unimpressed glare I shot at him. “Alright! Liked by the person who hates everything!”

“I don’t hate everything anymore,” I said, rolling my eyes. That was only half-true; I still hated everyone, but it wasn't as bad as it used to be. It could more accurately be called overwhelming disdain. “I drank _way_ too much vodka in high school to keep caring about shit like that.”

“You’re a vodka guy, huh?” Kenny said, leaning towards me with a suggestive smirk. I didn’t react. “What’s your poison? Smirnoff? Grey Goose? Belvedere?”

I shrugged. “Whatever I could get my hands on. Sometimes I managed to get Balkan, so that was pretty cool.” A thing to know about me and my liquid courage . . . well, I wouldn’t say I was _picky_ about my alcohol, but . . . I liked the strong, strong stuff. My provider -- a sketchy-looking kid named Travis that, in hindsight, I probably should’ve stayed away from -- told me that Balkan Vodka was the highest proof he could get me. I could never drink too much at a time; that shit fucked me up.

“Jesus Christ, dude,” Kenny said with a laugh. “That shit can kill you!”

“Like you can talk, Kenny,” Kyle said with an eye roll. “I can’t remember a single time in high school that you were sober.”

“Yeah, but my life sucked,” he answered. “It only got even remotely good back in . . .” He sighed slowly, like he was _happy_ , and a huge smile went across his face. “Senior year,” he breathed, dropping his chin into his palm and staring somewhere above Cartman’s shoulder.

“Shut the fuck up with that shit,” Cartman said with a scoff. “We know your little fictional boyfriend is fucking fictional, jackass.”

Kenny actually blushed, and threw a napkin in Cartman’s direction. “Just because you and Kyle flaunt your Mr. Slave and Big-Gay-Al fag relationship everywhere you go, doesn’t mean everybody’s all for ass-fucking in public. My boyfriend just . . . he isn’t out yet, and I don’t want something . . . bad to happen to him.” Kenny was talking really slow, like he was thinking about every word that left his mouth.

“You’re gay?” I asked flatly. That actually caught me off guard. I had always thought that Kenny was the biggest slut for vagina. I didn’t peg him for the dick-sucking type.

Kenny shrugged. “Yeah. Well, kind of. I still like a nice set of tits, but I'm 100% into this one guy, and will be for the rest of my life. But I didn’t even know it until something happened, and now me and my boyfriend are dating. It’ll be our one-year anniversary next month.”

“So it’s serious?” I continued. I wasn’t particularly interested, but I guess it was as good as any other topic of conversation those morons could’ve come up with, so I went with it.

“It’s really serious,” he said immediately. “I actually love him.”

I raised my eyebrows, and didn’t miss the groans from the other three guys in response to his claim. “You . . . love him? You’ve been dating for not even a year, and you already know you love him?” I didn’t believe him for a second; he had to just be chasing cock, like the _pussy_ -chasing Kenny I remembered.

He looked oddly offended by that. “Fuck you. When you finally get a girlfriend, or a _boyfriend_ , you’ll understand.”

I raised my hands up, trying to show him I didn’t mean anything. “I’m just saying, you’ve been known to think with your dick in the past.”

Kenny scowled -- actually fucking _scowled_ \-- at me, but Stan cleared his throat and interrupted by saying, “So, how’s your guinea pig? I remember you were, like, obsessed with that thing.”

I lowered my arms and frowned at the subject change. “Stripe #4 is dead.”

He looked like he’d been slapped, probably because of how blunt I was. He should’ve been used to me acting like I didn’t give a fuck. “Um. Oh. I’m sorry.”

I gave him a blank look. I’d rather Kenny had killed me for insulting his and his boyfriend’s honor or whatever, than listen to Stan act like the death of my guinea pig, (who lasted longer than expected), was his fault. “You didn’t kill her. She was eight when she died. Guinea pigs don’t usually live that long.”

“Yeah, but, still.” He didn’t say anything else, so I assumed he was just going through the motions of being polite. I guess I couldn’t really blame him for that.

“Ohhhh,” Clyde suddenly exclaimed, slapping the table. “Look at that hottie over there!” He tilted his head, staring at another waitress, (that wasn’t ours), that was standing across the room. She had long, red hair that fell down to the middle of her back, and she was conversing with a customer, her head flying back in laughter when the customer said something funny. “Perfect rack. Cock-sucking lips. _Voluptuous_ ass. Mmm mmm mmm. I’d tap that.”

I didn’t know what to say, so I didn’t say anything. And nobody else answered him, either. And once he realized that he was getting no response, he sighed and dropped his chin into his palm. “Fuck, I forgot. Three of you are gay, Stan’s got a girlfriend that gets ultra mega jealous if he so much as looks at another girl, and Craig . . .” His eyes flicked over to me. “Are you single?”

I nodded.

“Well, what do you think?” he asked impatiently. “Do I have a chance?”

I shrugged. “Go for it. I’m not into redheads, so I don’t really care. Do what you want.”

Cartman coughed into his hand, saying loudly, “Fag,” before clearing his throat and apologizing insincerely.

I ignored him.   

“I’m gonna do it,” Clyde said, more to himself than any of us. “I’m just going to walk over there, and say, ‘Excuse me miss, but can I have a glass of milk? You’re so hot, I think I just burnt my tongue.’”

I snorted. “That’s a good one. Go with that. That’ll impress her for sure.”

“Dude, it’s totally worked before!” he insisted, tearing his eyes away from the redhead enough to give me a serious look. (Something that did not fit his face.) “That exact line is how I got Bebe to go to prom with me!”

“You went to prom with Bebe?” I asked blankly. “She actually _agreed_ to go to prom with you?”

“She sure did,” Clyde answered proudly. “I didn’t even have to do much to convince her!”

“Well, come on, Bebe was a total slut senior year,” Cartman said with an eye roll. “I heard her yammering with some other sluts in our grade about how she only had one more year to do whatever she wanted before she had to get serious with school and shit. She probably only said yes because you were the first semi-decent looking guy who asked her.”

“I’ve gotta go with Cartman on this one,” Kyle added. “She had a date with a different guy every weekend for the last six months of senior year.”

Holy shit. I hadn’t even _talked_ to that many people in my entire life, let alone slept with any of them. As a matter of fact, I hadn’t even slept with anybody. I was a complete and utter virgin, even though I didn’t look like it at first glance. I knew I was at least a little attractive. I got a lot of attention from the girls throughout high school, but that might’ve been because they were interested in the ‘bad boy’ who had suddenly shown up in their town. I could’ve lost my virginity my first week in Middle Town, but I just wasn’t feeling it.

“Bebe’s gotten better,” Stan said. “Over the summer, she didn’t go on a single date. She spent the whole time hanging out with Wendy and working at Harbucks. Thirty hours a week.”

“And she totally left a string of broken hearts behind her,” Kenny chimed in. “Being the South Park sexual love guru, I had a line-up of guys who were ‘hopelessly in love with Bebe Stevens and her beautiful blonde hair and her perfect diamond blue eyes and the way her smile can light up the darkest room.’” His face scrunched up in disgust. I’m guessing one of his clients or whatever actually said that to him, and I swear to God, that was one of the cheesiest, cringiest thing I’d ever heard. “She turned all of them down. It was kind of a bitchy move, but I guess I get why she did it. I mean, the guys all told me she told them no strings attached. It was their dumbass faults that she pretty much dropped off the face of the earth to them.”

“Jesus Christ. You guys pay attention,” I said. I was actually a little impressed by how well they were able to retain information about their surroundings. Or even that they cared enough to retain information about their surroundings, especially such trivial and 100% useless information such as Bebe Stevens’ dating habits.

Kyle shrugged. “South Park’s a small ass town. Everybody’s always in everybody’s business.”

Ah, yes. That was one of my least favorite parts about my hometown. How everybody knew each other so goddamn well that they could pretty much tell their life story at a crappy diner hundreds of miles from home. I mean, I was on the edge of being a recluse throughout my entire existence in South Park. I went straight home after school, watched Red Racer until dinner, and occasionally went out to play with the other kids. I spent a lot of time by myself, playing Spaceman Craig, and making small little fake-cities for the four Stripes, and looking at the stars and trying to find the constellations I’d read about in books from the school library. (Probably the closest thing I ever came to caring about my education when I was a kid.) But even _I_ knew that Stan’s parents had a crappy marriage that was constantly on the verge of breaking. I knew that Principal Victoria and our school lunch guy were always having sex after school hours in the teacher’s lounge. I knew that Cartman’s mom was the biggest slut in probably the universe. Hell, I even knew that Butters Stotch’s parents used to beat him every once in awhile, and that nobody ever did anything about it.

Jesus Christ, the things you remember. It shook the hell out of me, all those memories hitting me all at once. I thought I’d successfully blocked South Park from my brain, mostly because I had no interest in getting stuck in my past, but I guess college didn’t want that for me.

“You can say that again,” I mumbled, furrowing my eyebrows.

“So, how _is_ Bebe?” Kenny asked, turning his attention back to Stan. “I haven’t seen her in a long time.”

Stan shrugged. “She’s good. Just working and staying in and shit. Her life is more boring than Kyle’s now.”

Kyle frowned. “My life is plenty exciting. Ask Cartman.”

“Kahl, your life is about as dry as Towlie when he’s high,” Cartman said with an eye roll. “I swear, if it wasn’t for me, you’d spend all your time reading chemistry textbooks and watching Grey’s Anatomy.” He snorted. “Fuck, if it wasn’t for me, you’d probably never leave your room ever.”

“There’s nothing wrong with taking an interest in your studies,” Kyle defended. He hesitated for a moment, before adding, “And it’s if it _weren’t_ for you. Not if it _wasn’t_.”

“Kahl . . .” Cartman sighed, wrapping an arm around Kyle’s shoulders. “I love you and all, but you’re starting to act like a bitch.”

I expected Kyle to punch Cartman’s lights out for touching him and calling him a bitch, but he just rolled his eyes, leaning into Cartman’s body and saying, “Hey, it’s not my fault you spent more time sleeping in English class than actually paying attention to what the fuck was happening.”

“When is knowing the difference between were and was going to be helpful?” Cartman asked blankly, and, before Kyle could even answer, he said, “That’s what I thought. Never.”

Kyle had opened his mouth to answer, but the waitress suddenly appeared from behind me, a large tray of food balanced between her upper arm and her forearm, another one clasped in the same hand, and one of those little collapsable table things in her other hand. I never understood how waitresses managed to hold so much food all at once without dropping any of it. I mean, I wasn’t a klutz or anything, but I was not coordinated enough to hold six people’s meals while also not running into the busy path of other equally graceful waiters and waitresses bustling in the opposite direction.

Tweek was _really_ uncoordinated, I remember thinking offhandedly. I couldn’t even imagine what he would be like as a waiter. He’d knock over every plate of food that was even placed in his near vicinity, and he’d panic whenever he had to deal with a bitchy customer, and he’d probably forget what type of cheeses go with what type of burger. I’d probably laugh my ass off watching him run back and forth between the kitchen and the dining areas, that anxious expression on his face, and the words, “Doggone it, people like me,” escaping his teeth like a self-help mantra. That sounds cruel as hell, admitting I’d laugh at his continued misfortune, but it’s just such a funny thing to picture: a Tweek in an apron, his hair pushed back by those little pin things that girls always have a million of, and stain after stain of marinara sauce, and tomato soup, and mustard all over his clothes. He’d look like a child. A grown man-child, and he’d apologize for every mistake, and people would feel so bad for him, that he’d get the best tips. All of which he’d spend on coffee.

Thinking back on Tweek, after having reconnected with my old friends from South Park, put a few things into perspective. The first thing I had realized was that Tweek Tweak would probably fit right the fuck in with the insanity of my home town. Cartman would rip on him like crazy, Kenny would probably take a spaz like him under his wing, and Stan and Kyle would have a secret meeting to discuss whether or not Tweek could be trusted with the drama-shit they always managed to stir up. He’d disrupt the normal flow of South Park, but he was so goddamn nuts that people would soon forget he hadn’t actually lived there for long. Hell, back when I begrudgingly considered myself a South Park kid, I probably would’ve been his friend. I would have realized that Stan’s gang would’ve just taken advantage of Tweek’s naivety, and paranoid delusions, so I would’ve decided that it’d be best if Tweek became apart of my gang. Clyde would’ve took to him like a baby to a rattle, Token probably wouldn’t care, as long as Tweek wasn’t an asshole, and Jimmy liked fucking everybody, (not in the literal sense).

It was such a weird thought. That I knew I probably would’ve been friends with Tweek if we’d known each other for as long as I’d known Clyde, and Token, and Jimmy. Because, at that point, after having only known Tweek for two days, I’d decided we weren’t friends. I didn’t see him as my friend. He was just my roommate.

“-aig? Craig?”

A pair of fingers were suddenly snapping in front of my face, and I blinked a few times to clear my head. “What?” I asked blankly, after I recovered from my little lapse into my thoughts.

“Dude, you were spacing the fuck out for a second there,” Kenny said with a laugh. “We tried calling your name like three times, but you didn’t answer any of us. Whatcha thinkin’ about?” He had a suggestive smirk on his face, but he was purposefully misleading himself, thinking I’d actually been thinking about some girl.

“I’m not thinking about what you think I’m thinking about,” I said firmly.

“Well, then what _were_ you thinking about?” Kenny pressed.

I shrugged. I might as well have been truthful. It’s not like I had anything important to hide. “I was thinking about my roommate.”

The table went quiet for a moment. “. . . You were thinking about your roommate?” Cartman asked slowly, as if reaching for clarification. “As in like . . . you and him, ‘naked in a bed and writhing under the covers' thinking, or . . .?”

I felt my cheeks heat up, even though I told the blood in my veins to fuck off. “No, not him and I - no. _No_ , that’s not what I was thinking.” I shivered at the thought. “I was just thinking that he’s, like, actually kinda crazy, and, thinking about South Park, made me realize that he’d be the perfect citizen there.”

“You were pretty out of it just now,” Cartman observed thoughtfully, folding his arms over his chest and staring at me. “And all because you were thinking about your _guy_ roommate. Are you sure you’re not, like, hella gay for him or something?”

I frowned. “Yes, I’m sure. I’m not gay, first of all, and second of all, even if I was, I’ve only known him for two days. That’s _way_ too soon to ‘turn hella gay’ for anyone. Besides, we’re not even really friends.”

“Well, you’ve spent the past two days with him, haven’t you?” Clyde said. “You sleep in the same room as him; you kinda _have_ to spend time with him.”

I hesitated telling the truth, but only for a moment. I’d gotten past the point of caring what other people thought about my attachment to Red Racer. “We spent the last couple days watching Red Racer.”

There was a beat of silence, before the entire table burst into laughter, and I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, yeah. _Craig still watches Red Racer_. Real funny.”

“Naw, man, that’s not why we’re laughing,” Cartman said in between obnoxious chuckles. “That is the gayest fucking thing I can even think of.”

“Whatever,” I grumbled under my breath, hunching over in my seat and staring at my plate. I was getting really fucking sick of those assholes, Cartman especially. I didn’t really hate them, at least not as passionately as I did when I was a kid, but I was beginning to remember the incentive I had for hating them to begin with.

Coming down from his laughter, Stan wiped away his tears and said “So, have you dated at all these past few years?”

I waited until he was still and actually paying attention before I said, “Not really.”

“Haven’t found Ms. Right?” Kyle asked with an understanding smile.

I shrugged. “I guess not.”

“ _Oooor_ ,” Cartman said in a sing-song voice. “He’s a raging faggot!”

Normally, I didn’t really get all pissy about stupid stuff people said about me, but Cartman was just pissing me off so fucking much, and it was the first day of class, and, thanks to my twitchy roommate, I’d only gotten like four hours of sleep the night before. That’s the _only_ reason why I glared at him and said, “Fuck _off,_  Cartman, I’m not gay.”

Cartman just scoffed and rolled his eyes. “Yeah, okay. Is ‘not gay’ a clever euphemism for ‘total fudge packer’?”

“Dude, seriously, lay off,” Stan said before I could answer. “He’s not gay. And besides, even if he was, it’s not like _you_ can say anything about it.”

“Hey, it’s not my fault my gaydar points up whenever I look at him,” Cartman said casually. “Kahl, your input, please?”

I expected Kyle to deny it, maybe yell at Cartman for being an asshole, but instead he rested his cheek in his palm and gazed at me thoughtfully. “I don’t know. I’m conflicted.”

“Well, let me clear it up for you,” I said, downing my entire class of orange juice. “For the fifth time. I’m not gay. And if you don’t change the subject, I’m going back to my dorm room. My roommate’s probably freaking out right now, anyway.”

“There he goes with his roommate again,” Cartman said with a laugh. “Is your roommate a raging fag, too?”

“And with that, I’m leaving,” I announced, scratching my chair out, pulling out my wallet, and tossing some Washington’s and a Hamilton on the table.

“Wait!” Clyde said, standing as well and looking at me, almost sadly. “We should hangout sometime. And we don’t even have to invite Cartman, if he’s going to be an asshole.”

“ _Ay!_ -”

I shrugged. “Sure. Give me your phone, I’ll give you my number.” I took the phone from Clyde’s outstretched hand, giving him a deadpanned look when I saw that his phone case was a unicorn with sparkles. He smiled sheepishly at me, but didn’t explain, so I shook my head, (feeling somewhat disappointed in him), and entered my number, before giving it back.

I looked at all of them, before swinging my bookbag over my shoulder and saying, “‘Bye,” and walking away without another word.

Oh my fucking God, my departure was so awkward and uncomfortable. I could feel my soul stretching from my body towards my dorm room, even though I knew that all that was waiting for me was Tweek. It seemed like no matter where I went, I was surrounded by awkward interactions, but awkward interactions with Tweek weren’t really all that bad. Mostly because, so far, it had been _him_ that was awkward, and _me_ that was confused and forced to soak in the awkwardness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know this ends a little abruptly, but this is just part one of this scene. Next chapter will be the continuation of the day back at Craig and Tweek's dorm room.


	5. The Gayest Thing I Can Even Think Of: Part II

As soon as the door closed behind me, and I saw that the room was completely empty, I rolled my eyes. That sight wouldn’t have been weird, except for the fact that the coffee maker was currently brewing a cup, and the scent was instantly recognizable.

“Tweek, it’s just me,” I announced blankly. “You can come out.”

There was a muffled, “GAH!” before the familiar head of spiky blonde hair poked out from under Tweek’s bed. “Craig?”

“Yeah,” I said swinging my bookbag off of my shoulder. “Your roommate. You remember me, right?”

He frowned, crawling all the way out and clambering to his feet. “GAH! Of course I remember you. I was just making sure you weren’t a -- GAH! -- a robot, or an -- NGH! -- alien or something.” He sucked in a breath, and reached up towards his head, pulling harshly on his hair. “Oh, God, oh, _Jesus_ , what if you were kidnapped and replaced by one of the lizard people! They’re everywhere, you know! They could be anybody, just waiting for the right time to overthrow humanity! GAH! NGH! EHH! You’re not, are you? Oh, who am I kidding, even if you were, you wouldn’t tell me --”

Jesus, I must’ve really ruffled his feathers for him to get all . . . twitchier than normal. He was on the verge of full-on panic mode, and I wasn’t even sure what set him off. “Tweek, I promise I’m not a lizard person,” I said in a flat voice.

He breath was laborious and uneven as he stuttered out, “You promise?”

“I swear on my life.”

Tweek let out a slow breath, and nodded, releasing his death-grip on his hair. “Okay, good. Um . . . How was your first class?”

I paused at the foot of my bed, a little surprised by the question, mostly because I didn’t think we were acquaintances enough to be asking each other about our days. “Um . . . it was good,” I said slowly, narrowing my eyes at him. “How was yours?”

He shrugged/twitched. “GAH! Boring. People share too much about their personal lives.”

I smirked, pleasantly surprised that he actually realized how ridiculous it was to share in gross detail your origin story with strangers. I wasn’t about to go _telling_ him I was pleasantly surprised, though. Not really my thing. I spoke in gestures, not words. “Dude, with the way you shake, you might as well wear your life story on your forehead.”

He scowled. “GAH! I told you yesterday not to be an asshole.”

“Yeah, and then I laughed at you.”

Tweek frowned, folding his arms over his chest and turned away with a twitchy huff. He looked so funny pouting, like a child that wasn’t getting his way. It made the corners of my mouth lift up the slightest bit, watching the grown man-child in front of me, sitting on his bed, with his arms folded over his chest, cocooned with his knees pressed against his forearms. But I didn’t smile. I didn’t do that for people I didn’t even consider my friend. Just my roommate. And I didn’t like him like that, or whatever the asshole quartet and the man whore Clyde thought.

I took pity on him. I fucking took pity on him, and said, in a voice that I hoped conveyed indifference, “I saw some old . . . I guess you could say friends, back from when I still lived in South Park. We went out for . . . breakfast?” I shrugged, remembering I ordered breakfast food for lunch, which was slightly out of character for me. “It was interesting. I couldn’t care less about a few of the people I saw again, but I did get to hang out with my old best friend, so that was cool.”

Okay, so I hadn’t planned on telling him that much, but the words just flowed from my mouth. He was surprisingly easy to talk to, despite the fact that he was still making his whimpering “GAH!”s every so often when I spoke.

“NGH! Cool,” he said. “Who were your friends? Maybe I had a class with them.”

“Well, Clyde Donovan was my best friend, and he was the only one I was . . . happy to see again.” I said it. I wasn’t happy I said it, but I said it. “And then there was Kyle Broflovski, Stan Marsh, Kenny McCormick, and Eric Cartman.”

Tweek let out a weird shrieking noise, not like his usual screeches. “E-Eric Cartman? I just had physics with him!”

I raised a curious eyebrow. “First impression?”

Without a second of hesitation, Tweek blurted out, “He’s -- NGH! -- obsessed with Kyle!”

If I _hadn’t_ just had lunch with those assholes, I probably still would’ve believed it, but in a completely different way. “How do you know that? And how do you know Kyle?”

“You know how I said people share too much?” He didn’t wait for me to answer before rambling, “He wouldn’t shut up about his boyfriend! GAH! I never even _saw_ Kyle, but I could tell you exactly what he looks like!”

I shook my head. It was so fucking weird that Cartman and Kyle were dating. I couldn’t wrap my head around it, they were so different, and I was _sure_ they still hated each other.

“Is his ass really that great?”

I choked on my saliva. _Did Tweek really just say that to me?_ I thought incredulously, staring at him with slightly-widened eyes. Every time I thought I understood Tweek, he would do something that caught me completely off guard. “I don’t know,” I answered, once I recovered. “I don’t really look at other guys’ asses.”

Tweek kept on talking, despite my response. “He wouldn’t shut up about it! Or him! Eric Cartman talked about his boyfriend for five minutes straight, before he was ordered to stop talking and sit down.”

I couldn’t hold back a smirk. “That sounds exactly like him. He doesn’t know when to shut up. You know, all throughout lunch today, he kept making fun of me for being gay.” I blinked, and immediately backpedaled, saying quickly, “I mean, I’m _not_ gay, but he’s, like, obsessed with me _being_ gay. Every time he opened his mouth, it was either to make fun of one of his friends, or to call me a ‘raging fag.’”

Tweek winced, biting his lip and looking away. “Sounds like an asshole.”

“To put it lightly,” I agreed with a nod. I plopped down on my bed, not planning on saying anything else to him, and opened up my laptop, which was sitting at the end of my bed. To be fair, my ignoring him wasn’t exactly new to either of us, and I had talked to him more than I’d talked to anybody in an average week before meeting him, so I figured I needed a break.

It pissed me off how much I just didn’t care about not caring when he was around me. I always forgot that I was supposed to be completely indifferent to everything. And we had hardly spent any time together!

Well . . . we had watched three seasons of a kids show together, (a show that I had, for the past ten years, resorted to watching by myself), in a fucking sweet fort that he had made, while actually _laughing_ , (something that I hadn’t done in ten years), and having serious discussions about whether or not the Black Racer was actually the bad guy or not. _That_ was something I had never actually done with anybody before, because nobody was ever interested.  

Damn, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that maybe I was . . . growing closer to him than I had previously thought. But it was kinda hard not to grow at least a little close to him! It was so fucking weird meeting someone who had the same obsession with children shows that I did. I guess maybe I was just . . . caught up in the idea of finally having a Red Racer buddy.

Speaking of my favorite TV show . . . I glanced down at my laptop, which still had the ENTER PASSWORD screen displayed, and cocked my head in thought. I _could’ve_ continued to ignore the twitchy guy on the other side of the room, (who was still emitting those little GAH! noises every now and then), and zone out playing minesweeper, or checked the NOVA website to see if they’d posted another article on black holes, or messed with a Wikipedia Article to ruin some moron’s research paper. Or I could give in and to the inclination to hang out with him.

I actually weighed the options in my head. Red Racer and pretending I wasn’t starting to view Tweek as more than just my roommate, or sinking into myself like I did back in high school . . .

My decision might shock you. I hesitated for just a moment, before closing my laptop, digging in one of my begs by the end of my bed, and held up a DVD case as I turned to my roommate. “Red Racer?” I asked. And, just to make the offer more enticing, I added, “We’ve only made it to season three. We’ve still got twelve seasons left.”

No sooner had these words left my mouth, and Tweek was on his feet, busy removing the various papers and pencils from his bed to his bedside table. I hadn’t noticed that before; he was really fucking unorganized, though I don’t know why I was surprised.

I was about to ask what the hell he was doing, because he hadn’t even answered me yet, but my question was answered before I could ask it, when he suddenly flung his mattress onto the floor, and began stretching out his blanket to use as a canopy.

I knew I should’ve probably started setting up the show, but I _had_ to stop for a moment to watch Tweek make that fucking sweet fort. I didn’t get a chance to watch the first couple times; I just turned my back, and when I looked again, he was twitching again, and standing next to this masterpiece sculpture. I refused to believe that he was calm enough in that window of time that I wasn’t looking, to be able to construct the fort of my dreams.

So I folded my arms over my chest, and tilted my head, watching him as he arranged and rearranged his coffee table, and the bedside table. His face was scrunched in concentration, the tip of his tongue poking out between his lips, and his normally vibrating eyes were sharp with focus on what he was doing. I had no idea he could be so calm. It sorta made me rethink his character, that I thought I knew so well. I remember thinking earlier that day that there was no way he could ever cope in a waiting job, and, while I still thought it was true, the image of him running to and fro had warped from him doing it in an all-out panic mode, to him doing it in slightly-panicked mode, with a hint of actually knowing what he was doing. But that might’ve just been because he was so interesting in engineering that he let himself forget about his anxiety and just _build_.  

I guess I must’ve spaced out, because suddenly Tweek was standing in front of me, his head cocked to the side, and one eye closed. “GAH! -- Can you move?” he asked, gesturing with his head to the mattress that I was sitting on.

I scrambled to my feet, in a way that immediately made me cringe in embarrassment, and allowed him to continue his building.

When it was all over, he plopped down on one side, and patted the empty spot next to him, wordlessly asking me to sit beside him. I obliged.  As I started to set everything up, Tweek moved around a little bit to get comfortable, before blurting out,

“GAH! This next episode is my favorite.”

I blinked, stopping the motion of pressing play, to turn and look at him with a raised eyebrow. “Really?”

“Yeah. NGH! -- I have the whole thing memorized.”

He said this so nonchalantly, but that was so fucking impressive. I mean, I knew my Red Racer pretty well, and, sure, I was capable of mouthing the words to certain scenes, but I’d never completely memorized an entire episode before. If I wasn’t so indifferent, I would’ve told him so, but instead I decided to divert the conversation.

“It’s a filler episode,” I said in a flat voice.

“Well, yeah, but aren’t all the episodes filler episodes? It’s a kids’ show.”

My heart skipped a beat. I sputtered for a few seconds, (something I had actually never done, ever), before managing out, “What the _fuck_? How can you even say that? There definitely _are_ filler episodes! Did you _never_ notice how each season follows certain storylines? Like how in season seven, Red, Blue, and Green Racer have to team up with Black Racer, their supposed ‘sworn enemy’ in order to defeat those creepy White Racer Twins? Or in season twelve when Red Racer is accused of cheating, put on probation, and has to enlist the help of his friends to figure out who framed him? That’s what us in the cinema-appreciation club call a ‘storyline’, Tweek, and anything that strays from that storyline is what we call a ‘filler episode.’” So, I was being a patronizing dick, I know. But, I don’t fucking know, I just sorta flew off the handle and started ranting about nothing to do with anything actually important, but everything to do with what was important at the moment.

Tweek looked a little frightened, but also vaguely amused by my sudden outburst. He didn’t say anything.

I shook my head, turning my attention back to the TV. “I’m just going to hit play so you can realize how wrong you are.”

* * *

It was about six-thirty when the stiffness in my legs actually registered. I glanced at my phone, noticing the time, and hit the PAUSE button on the remote before the next episode could play. Turning to Tweek, I asked, “So . . . you wanna go to dinner?”

Tweek shook his head. “GAH! No, I buy all my food.”

I blinked. “You . . . _buy_ all your food? You know you can pre-purchase a certain number of meals a week through the cafeteria, right?”

He nodded. “Yeah, but I don’t like -- NGH! -- being around so many people at once. Everybody pushing each other to get the biggest piece of ham, and having to find a table empty enough so that nobody notices you, and trying not to get trampled by people twice my size.” His hands flew up to his hair, gripping tightly as he continued his rant. “It’d be so easy to get taken in a room with so many people! GAH! What if I go with you, and someone kidnaps me when you’re not looking! I could be sold into the slave trade, and I’d never get to see my parents again --”

He started to panic, so I patted him on the shoulder, which shut him up instantly. He was shaking under my hand, and he was . . . surprisingly warm. Like a _furnace_. I just pretended I didn’t notice how hot he was -- temperature-wise -- and said, “First of all, I wouldn’t let you get sold into the slave trade. You’d be next to me the whole time, and I’d notice pretty quickly if you were suddenly not around anymore. You make a lot of noise, you know.” I ignored his slightly irritated stare. “And second of all, you don’t have to come with me to dinner. It was just a question. I’ll eat really fast and then come back up. I should probably do _some_ of my work before I completely lose all motivation.”

“You could just eat here with me,” Tweek suddenly offered meekly, shrinking just a little bit when I stared in surprise. “Or not. GAH! NGH! You don’t have to, but it might get lonely up here with you gone so long, and what if -- EHH! -- what if _you_ get kidnapped, and I’m not there to try to stop it, or yell for help, or call the police, and I’ll never see _you_ again --”

I shook my head, desperate to get his delusional ravings out of my head. It was like a tape worm, and enough to get you paranoid about literally everything around you. “Alright, Jesus Christ, I’ll eat up here,” I said to interrupt him. I didn’t want to embarrass him too bad by questioning why he was so bothered by never seeing me again. After all, we’d only known each other for a weekend. I didn’t think I’d be too sad to not have him in my life anymore. I mean, I wouldn’t want him to be kidnapped and sold into the slave trade, or anything ridiculous like that, and maybe I would miss having someone to watch Red Racer with. (I guess I was just getting spoiled by finally having someone in my life that would sit through hours, upon hours, upon hours, of a kids show with me.) And _he_ was probably just relieved I wasn’t out to rape/murder him, and if he were assigned a new roommate, he’d have to live that fear all over again. “Just . . . stop freaking out, okay?”

He nodded shakily. “Okay.”

Aaaand so that was how I found myself sitting on the fort Tweek had made, an entire box of granola bars, a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and a bottle of Aquafina in front of me. Him and I had adjusted ourselves so we were laying on our stomachs, propped up by our elbows, and staring vaguely in front of us at nothing. We had decided to take a brief Red Racer break. As much as I loved that show, we’d been watching it for five hours straight. My eyes were stinging from the constant exposure to the television screen.

We had been eating in silence for, like, five minutes, and it was so fucking uncomfortable. So, logically, I decided to fill it. With the first thing that came to my head. “So, did you make any friends at all?” _Jesus Christ_ , I thought with a grimace, as soon as the words left my mouth. I sounded like a concerned parent. That _wasn’t_ where I meant the conversation to go! But for once, I was unnerved by the awkward silence. Which, once again, was the complete opposite of what I would normally do.  

Tweek closed one eye, frowned at me, and said, in a deadpanned voice, “GAH! What do you think?”

I shrugged. He had a point, but . . . “You never know. If my dumbass best friend from South Park can make friends with his fellow dumbasses that we used to hate, then you can make friends with _some_ body.” I snorted. “ _Anybody_.”

He twitched again, but didn’t really acknowledge the insult. “Well, I didn’t. I found a lot of people that I wouldn’t ever be friends with, _ever_ , even if someone was holding a bazooka to my head. Like Eric, for example.”

“Cartman,” I said, shaking my head. “Call him Cartman. No one calls him Eric, not even Kyle.”

“How come?”

I shrugged again. “He’s always been Cartman, ever since preschool. He just doesn’t feel like an Eric. Get to know him a little bit, and you’ll see. Or, better yet, don’t.”

“NGH! I don’t think I’ll _ever_ be friends with him,” Tweek said, his voice bordering on panicked at the very thought. “You didn’t hear what he was talking about back there! He was only allowed to speak for like five minutes, and he managed to preach hate against hippies, Jews, gingers, _and_ Syrians!” I frowned thoughtfully. Syrians was a new one; I didn’t remember him having much to say about them when I was younger. “I’m surprised he wasn’t expelled on the spot!”

I rolled my eyes. “That fatass has always managed to avoid getting in trouble. I mean, him and I pretty much lived in detention together, but you wouldn’t believe the shit he did back in South Park. He would’ve been sent to jail for life if he were an adult at the time, that’s how bad it was. But I don’t want you to have nightmares or whatever, so I’ll spare you the details.”

“GAH! -- thanks.”

“No problem. The point is, stay away from him. I mean, he seems harmless now. I don’t think he’ll murder you, or anything, as long as you stay away from Kyle, but I promise you, he will do _anything_ to piss you off, just because he can.” I absentmindedly rubbed my shoulder. “And I seem to remember you having a mean right hook.”

I don’t know what I expected out of my off-handed observation, but it wasn’t a huge fucking grin crossing Tweek’s face. “Thanks. I can hold my own.”

I looked at him dubiously. First of all, I highly doubted it. And then second of all, where the hell did all his confidence come from? Our first night, he was ranting about how he was too small to do anything against an intruder, and suddenly he was so sure he could take just anybody in a fight?  “Uh, Tweek?”

The smile slipped into a frown of confusion. “What?” When I just raised an eyebrow, he realized what I was getting at, and he huffed. “I _can_!”

I smirked. “Sure, maybe you could hold your own against, like, a first grader, but anybody _older_ than that -”

“I’ve won fights before!” he insisted, furrowing his eyebrows defiantly. I must’ve looked at him like he was crazy, because he averted his eyes, and hesitated, before admitting, “Um . . . _a_ fight, but still!”

I folded my arms over my chest, (which was a little awkward, considering my position), and decided to mess with him a little bit. It was fun to see him all huffy and childish and petty. “Could you win a fight against _me_?”

The sheepish expression just got worse. “Well . . . GAH! -- maybe not _you_. . . you’re _huge_.”

I tried not to blush. I really fucking did. But I felt my face get all hot anyway, and my smugness all but disappeared. “Thanks I guess?”

“NGH! GAH! I didn’t mean it like that!” he insisted, and when I looked over at him, he was staring at me, wide-eyed, and worrying his bottom lip. “You’re not -- EHH! -- _fat_ , or anything,” _Ohhh, so_ that’s _what he thought I thought he meant_. . . “But you’re like seven feet tall or something --”

“Dude, I’m only 6’4’’ --”

“ _Only 6’4_ ’',” Tweek mocked, rolling his eyes. “You’re an entire foot taller than me. You could step on me, and crush me with your 6’4’’ weight.

“I only weigh 150 pounds --”

“ _Only 150 pounds_ ,” Tweek mocked again. “You’re 30 pounds heavier than I am. You’re Rambo compared to me.”

I smirked. I had to admit, I was feeling really fucking good, receiving all this positive attention, and with a momentarily inflated ego, came irresponsible confidence. I unfolded my arms, and patted him warmly on the shoulder. He was vibrating, like he always was, and that thought of his being so unreasonably warm came back to my mind, a little more readily than it had before. “Well, I’ve been boxing since I was thirteen,” I said casually. “I can bench press 150 pounds. I’ve been told that’s good.”

Tweek rolled his eyes. God, it was so fucking weird to watch him roll his eyes. It didn’t match his whole ‘anxious and twitchy’ persona he had going on. “You’re being an asshole again. I didn’t compliment you just so you could turn into a total dick.” He said that so casually, and he was grinning like he didn’t care that I was acting like a dick, that I wasn’t offended. It was the same caliber as me calling him a spaz. I was however surprised by his word choice, because swearing just didn’t sound right in his voice.

I smirked. “Well, what about you? I bet you can bench 10 pounds max.”

My smugness disappeared when I felt a fist collide with my shoulder and I sucked in a breath, removing my hand from his body. He punched me in the exact same place as the last time; it was like he was searching for it. And, thanks to that asshole, I already had a pretty nasty, dark purple bruise on my upper arm.

“Remember that the next time you decide to be an asshole,” Tweek said, returning to his granola bar.

I don’t know what the fuck it was that made my stomach do this weird floppy shit, but there was something about that moment that cancelled out all of Tweek’s paranoia, and made him out to be this completely normal guy that I . . . was actually having a lot of fun hanging out with. I shook my head and looked away. I did not need that shit wiggling around in my head.

The rest of the night went by without a hitch. We finished eating, decided to watch only a couple more episodes of Red Racer, (I never really got around to doing that studying I told him I was going to, but he either didn’t notice, or didn’t say anything), before retiring to opposite ends of our room. And then we commenced pretending the other didn’t exist, as was normal for that time of night.

I wasn’t in the mood to listen to music, so, as I mindlessly scrolled through random, mostly horrible Creepypasta stories, I tried to ignore the sounds of the coffee maker that whirred to life every half hour.

But the fact that I could tell the grumbling noises of the brewing coffee came every half hour showed that I was clearly failing.


	6. More Than Just a Roommate

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so I know this is a bit of a fast update, (as I'm sure you've noticed, but I'm not exactly quick), but I've been sitting on this chapter for soooo long. I just had a few edits to do, and it was all set to go. Enjoy!

I can pinpoint the exact moment that I realized Tweek was more than _just a roommate_.

It was about two weeks into the semester. It irked me to no end, because when I first met him, I didn’t really _want_ him to be my friend. For some reason that I can’t even remember, I didn’t want to make a connection with him, or with anybody. We were just going to part ways, and I didn’t want to make friends just to suddenly leave and never see them again. That sounded dumb, and just a little irresponsible on my part. I guess that was the reason. I can’t think of any other reason, so I guess that was it.

I had just walked back to my dorm room after freshman biology, feeling completely bored out of my mind. In my opinion, biology was the most boring of the sciences, because it’s all about just what stuff is. Mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell. Photosynthesis. Punnett Squares. Homo Sapiens.

Charles Darwin is one of my least favorite people, so fuck him. And fuck Latin, too.

I was training to be an astrophysicist, if things went my way, because space is fucking awesome. I had the grades for it. And what lies beyond our planet is one of the only things that actually _interests_ me.

So, after having sat in a stuffy classroom for two and a half hours, I was finally fucking done with class for the rest of the day. For the _weekend_. It was an afternoon class, so I didn’t make it back until, like, 4:45, but I had no more responsibilities for the rest of the day, so I was just fine with that. And Tweek didn’t have any afternoon classes that day, so I didn’t have to wait for him to come back to the dorm room to recommence our Red Racer binging. It had been harder to watch together, because we actually had to start doing work, and there were less hours during the day to spend mindlessly watching children’s cartoons, due to long classes, so we’d kinda been slacking. The second I walked through that door, I was pretty much assaulted by the sight of Tweek, who had been sitting in the middle of the room, perched on top of that classic fort he always made, his arms folded over his chest and a determined look on his face.

I raised an eyebrow at him. “Um . . . hi, Tweek?”

He frowned. “GAH! You’re not studying tonight.”

That completely caught me off guard, and I stared at him blankly. “What?”

“NGH! It’s Friday. We’re _going_ to watch Red Racer.”

Alright, so that caught even _more_ completely off guard. I was so used to Tweek being all meek and shy and afraid of me yelling at him, so him suddenly being _assertive_ took me by _complete_ surprise. I mean, I wouldn’t have said no, because that was exactly how I’d been planning to spend the night anyway, but it . . . I don’t know, made me feel . . . good that Tweek wanted so badly to watch Red Racer with me.

I shrugged in response to him, and said in a flat voice, “Okay.”

I guess maybe Tweek was looking for me to put up some sort of fight, because he blinked a few times, his head twitching to the side, and he GAH’d, (as I’d come to call his sudden vocalization of anxiety). “Uh . . . oh . . .”

“Yeah. We were on episode . . . 14?”

“NGH! -- Yeah.”

There was a beat of silence, before I realized something. “Hey, Tweek? What would you have done if I said no?”

Tweek furrowed his eyebrows, averting his eyes in thought. “Uh . . . I don’t know . . . I was just kinda . . . Uh . . . huh . . .” He fell silent, and worried his bottom lip.

He was so childlike, it was unbelievable. I don’t know what the fuck it was, but there was something about that moment that made me grin, and when he glanced over at me, he caught the amusement on my face, and cocked his head. “GAH! What’s so funny?”

That made me realize just what the hell my face was doing, and I forced my lips to a straight line, and my eyes to their normal apathetic stare. “Nothing,” I said blankly. “Now, are we watching Red Racer or not?”

“NGH! Yeah!” Tweek said with an enthusiastic nod, and he patted the mattress next to him, a silent beckon for me to come over to him. I did.

We’d been watching for, I don’t know, like a few hours or something, when suddenly Tweek turned to me in between episodes and cleared his throat. Or, he GAH’d, and tried to make it sound like he cleared his throat. He looked really fucking nervous: he was twitching more than usual, his hands having found their way to his shirt front and yanking on the surprisingly-durable fabric, and his chest rising and falling in rapid succession. He just fucking stared at me for a few seconds, and, being understandably uncomfortable, I narrowed my eyes at him.

“What?” I asked, my voice a little more on edge than normal, but he was being really fucking weird, even for him.

“GAH! NGH! EHH!” Okay, so whatever the fuck he had to say, it was not going to be easy. And it might make me angry. And he was _terrified_ , and he hadn’t even said anything yet.

“Dude, it’s fine, just tell me,” I said, dropping my voice so that it lost all it’s irritation, in the hopes that it would calm him down.

It did to a degree, but he was still trembling like crazy. “GAH! Craig, I have to tell you something, and please don’t hit me!”

I raised an eyebrow at that. “There’s not a whole lot you could do that would make me want to hit you,” I answered, folding my arms over my chest. “What happened?”

“NGH! Nothing happened!” he exclaimed, the tone of his voice becoming more panicked by the second. “I just . . . _Ilikehangingoutwithyou_!”

The words left his mouth so fast that it took me a few seconds for the message to actually resonate in me. And then my eyes widened, my mouth dropping a fraction in surprise. Nobody had told me that before. Not even Clyde, or Token, or Jimmy. I mean, I knew they liked hanging out with me, or else they wouldn’t, but Tweek didn’t really seem like the person to confide anything in anyone, especially about his partiality to their company, so I, ( _understandably_ , I think), was taken aback.

But the part that surprised me the most, was how he held his arms in front of his face as soon as he stopped speaking, like he actually expected me to punch him in the face for admitting something like that. I don’t know, it made part of me feel a little bad that he was that scared of people, (even someone he’d been hanging out with for awhile), but it was also something so _Tweek_ , that I just couldn’t _not_ smile.

I didn’t answer for a few seconds, and, when Tweek realized that I wasn’t going to hit him, he slowly lowered his arms and stared at me with cautious eyes. I didn’t even realize I was smiling wide enough to be detected by him, but he frowned at me, and said, “GAH! Why are you smiling?”

Fuck, I hate it when people point out the fact that I’m feeling an emotion. It irks me to no end, and the fact that he said that made the smile drop from my face. “Sorry,” I said, in my classic monotone. “If you think I’m going to hit you, I’m not. That’s a stupid reason to hit someone. I just think it’s a little funny that you expect it. Kinda sad, but a little funny.” He looked a little miffed at that, and I figured, after that conversation, that I could afford a smile that someone else could see. A genuine smile, and not one that I would sport in front of just anyone. “You don’t have to be so nervous. I like hanging out with you, too. If I didn’t, then I wouldn’t.”

And then . . . _BAM_. That was the moment. I hadn’t even planned on saying that, but I did. It was out in the open. I didn’t actually want it to be at first, but it was. And I couldn’t take it back.

But I also didn’t _want_ to take it back.

Shut up, I was super fucking confused. I didn’t know what I wanted, but all I knew was that the small little grin that he shot me was totally worth completely embarrassing myself.

“Oh . . . GAH!” Tweek fiddled with his hands, like he was nervous, but there was still that smile on his face, that told me he was going to be just fine. “Good.”

I nodded, turning my face back to the TV. I was blushing. Fucking _blushing_. My face was all hot and uncomfortable. I didn’t want him to see it. “Yeah,” I said in response. “Just . . . don’t tell anyone.”

“NGH! I won’t.”

“Good. Now let’s stop talking. The last episode was a cliffhanger. I want to know what happens next.”

I could hear Tweek roll his eyes. “Craig, you already _know_ what happens next. You’ve seen this entire show how many times?”

“Lost count. But I don’t care if I know what happens next. I have to be sitting on the edge of my seat on principle.”

“GAH! If you say so.”

So, that was how Tweek and I actually became friends. Or, that was just when I realized that we had probably been friends since close to the beginning, I just didn’t want to admit it. He’s probably the least-likely person a person like me would choose for a friend: twitchy, paranoid, loud, doesn’t like sleep and unintentionally prevents _me_ from sleeping . . .

But, fuck, there I was. Being friends with Tweek Tweak. The weirdest person I’d ever met.

So, in hindsight, I should’ve known that I couldn’t have kept my asshole “friends” away from Tweek forever, but I thought if I acted like I _didn’t_ care about my roommate around said asshole friends, they wouldn’t be interested enough to even _want_ to see him. And it wasn’t like I wanted to keep Tweek to myself or anything stupid like that, I was just a little . . . wary of how they (specifically Cartman) would treat him. I mean, I may not be the most patient man in the world, because, usually, I would not have put up with bullshit of any stench, but there was something about the weird friendship that I had with Tweek that made some of the obnoxious things he did seem more . . . bearable.

Bottom line, I knew he was obnoxious. It just didn’t bother me so much.

So when Clyde asked if I wanted to visit the frat house he was trying, (and probably failing), to live in, two days after I’d realized Tweek was my friend, I hesitated. I had never spent too much time outside of my dorm room, and the only reason I had left _that_ time was because Tweek and I were hungry, and it was my turn to get bread, granola bars, peanut butter, and water. And candy. Tweek had a huge fucking sweet tooth. (After that first time eating food in the dorm room with Tweek, I hadn’t really had a reason to eat in the cafeteria. We could just eat and watch Red Racer, or eat and talk about dumb shit until our eyes were ready for more Red Racer. And, since I didn’t want to mooch off him completely, I’d taken to buying groceries for the both of us every once in awhile.)

But I wasn’t a complete recluse. I had the occasional outing with the old South Park guys over those two weeks. Well, we went out like twice. But it was only noon that day, and I was guessing Clyde wanted me out for a long, _long_ time. And I wasn’t sure how well Tweek would fair without me for so long, because he’d never really been without me for too long before.

As soon as that thought entered my mind, I instantly berated myself to the point where Clyde probably should’ve noticed the grimace on my face. _What the fuck?_ I thought incredulously, counteracting the previous, totally gay sounding thought. _He’s a grown man, he doesn’t have to be around me 24/7._ I _don’t need to be around_ him _24/7_.

And so, with that reasoning, I agreed. But not without offhandedly saying, “I just have to stop by my dorm room. I have to . . . check on something.”

Clyde grinned, leaning towards me and wiggling his eyebrows suggestively. “Ohhh,” he said slowly, as if he’d found some secret message in my words. “Got a girl waiting?” He glanced down at the grocery bag with a raised eyebrow. Probably thought I was getting whatever girl he thought was in my room a weird, granola-bar-and-peanut-butter-sandwich breakfast/lunch as a ‘thank you’ to whatever _services_ he thought this mythical _she_ did last night.

I stared at him, unblinkingly. How the fuck he came to that conclusion, only a perverted asshole like Clyde could’ve managed. “No,” I said flatly.

Clyde rolled his eyes. “Come on. It’s Sunday! Last night was _Saturday_ night! You’re a handsome, eligible bachelor who happens to be in college, so you’re young, stupid, and liable to make terrible decisions. So, spill. Is she hot? Is she that waitress from that diner that was totally checking you out?”

So apparently Clyde became practically an entirely different person since I’d last seen him. He was never that much of a dick back in elementary school and middle school, but I never saw what happened to him from age fifteen till then. He could’ve fucked the entire female population of the school, while I was holed up in my room with a joint and a bottle of Jack. Two _very_ different teenage experiences.

“No, Clyde. I didn’t bring a girl to my room last night. And I’m not even interested in that bitch. She had a lip ring, remember?” Even I could tell from my voice that he should fuck off with the whole assumptions thing, and, fucking surprisingly, he did. He didn’t believe me, but he did let it go, and, knowing Clyde, that was a blessing.

“So, if you _don’t_ have a girl, then what _are_ you checking on?” he asked innocently, following me as I stalked down the sidewalk in the direction of my dorm building.

I shot him a side look that told him he better knock it the fuck off, and that he was starting to piss me off. But, at the same time, he was coming with me, anyway, and he was bound to meet Tweek whether Tweek and I wanted him to or not. I sighed roughly and rolled my eyes. “I’m checking on my roommate. His name is Tweek, he’s got a really bad anxiety disorder, and I don’t like leaving him alone for too long. He panics if I do.”

Whatever reason Clyde was expecting, I guess it wasn’t that, because he raised an eyebrow at me in confusion and disbelief. “You actually . . . do you like someone? You, Craig Tucker, are actually _friends_ with another human being? Iron-hearted, bitch-ass _Craig Tucker_ -”

I groaned. “Yes, you obnoxious mother fucker,” I answered, beginning to feel more than irritated. “I’m friends with Tweek. And it’s not that surprising that I have _a_ friend. I was best friends with _your_ ass for my entire childhood, for some stupid fucking reason that I don’t even remember. So, lay off. And when you meet him, don’t be your normal dick self.”

“Because your _friiiiend_ ,” he drew out the word, like the asshole that he was, “will have a panic attack?”

I knew he was joking, but I actually _dreaded_ the moment other people that I was acquainted with met Tweek. I remember how messed up he was when he met _me_ , and I was the one person in the world that was least likely to want to harm him in any way, shape, or form. I know I say this a lot, but god _damn_ , Clyde was such an _asshole_. . .

“Yes,” I said, deadpanning. “If you freak him out, I’ll punch you in the spleen.”

“Alright, calm down, Jesus Christ,” Clyde said with a chuckle. “I’ll go easy on him.”

I didn’t answer him, but I sent mental warnings in his direction, a cross between threatening him and pleading with him to behave.

* * *

“Hey, Tweek,” I greeted, closing the door behind Clyde, and turning to face my roommate. He was sitting on his bed, his trembling fingers trying to organize some horrendously-scrawled notes from one of his classes. It was one of the first times I’d ever _walked in on him_ actually doing college work. He always started homework, and studying, after I did, and usually when I walked in on him, he was always doing something really fucking weird, (like hiding under the bed, for example), and I’d have to take a few seconds to really put his fucking weird habits into perspective.

He must not’ve heard Clyde and I coming, because he was actually in sight when we walked through the door. He jumped as I greeted him, as he usually did when he saw me, and screeched, “GAH! Craig!” I was a little afraid of his reaction to me bringing someone over without telling him, and that fear was justified, as he screamed at the top of his lungs, backed away into the far corner of his bed, and shouted, " _I don’t know you!_ ”

I sighed, choosing to ignore Clyde for a moment to calm Tweek down. “Tweek, it’s okay. This is Clyde. I told you about him a little while ago, remember? He was one of my old friends from South Park.”

That did nothing to calm Tweek down, and he dragged his trembling body across his bed, into a ball, and pressed himself as far away from us as he could. “NGH! EHH! But what if he wants to _kill_ me?!”

I sighed, pinching the bridge of my nose with my thumb and forefinger. “He doesn’t want to kill you, Tweek. I promise.”

“But you haven’t seen him in four years, he could be _anyone_ -”

I snorted. “No way. He’s the same moron that he was four years ago. He’s just hornier and friends with people we used to hate.”

I felt someone punch me on the arm, and was completely unsurprised to find a miffed Clyde at my side. Despite the fact that the punch didn’t really hurt all that bad, I still rubbed it distantly, as a gut reaction to the sudden pressure, and I rolled my eyes. I was about to say something probably rude, but Tweek suddenly screeched again.

“See?! He just _hit_ you -!”

“He was just joking, Tweek.”

“But -”

“Tweek, calm down,” I said firmly, but in that low voice he likes. “Clyde isn’t going to hurt you, I promise.” I glanced at Clyde out of the corner of my eye, nodding in Tweek’s direction, but the dumbass didn’t seem to get the hint. He just glanced between Tweek and I with this curious expression on his face, so I elbowed him in the ribs and added, “ _Right, Clyde?_ ”

Clyde yelped, even though I didn’t elbow him _that_ hard, and glared at me. I was completely unaffected by this. Fuck, _Tweek_ looked more intimidating than Clyde did when he glared. Once Clyde realized that he wasn’t going to scare me off or whatever, he turned his attention to my roommate and nodded. “What he said.”

I rolled my eyes. Not as eloquent an answer as I was hoping for, but I really don’t know why I got my hopes up to begin with. It was _Clyde_ , after all.

“Anyway, I _did_ end up making it the grocery store,” I said to Tweek, holding up the plastic bag in my hand. “Bread, peanut butter, um . . . granola bars, chocolate, and a shit ton of bottled water. Did I forget anything?”

Tweek was still in panic mode, despite my trying to calm him down, but he managed a nod of the head and said, “GAH! NGH! Yeah, that’s everything.”

I sighed. “Tweek, you seriously gotta chill. Make yourself some coffee.” I cocked my head curiously at him. “I’m actually surprised you’re not drinking any now.”

Tweek took a long, deep breath, closing his eyes and holding his hands to his heart. He was silent for a second before he started mumbling under his breath, “Center . . . find your center . . . green meadows . . . puppies . . .”

 _What the fuck?_ I thought, quirking my eyebrows in confusion. I’d never seen him do that before, and I was gonna ask what the fuck he was doing, but it seemed like a . . . fragile moment, or something gay like that. He looked like he was genuinely trying to calm himself down, and I didn’t want to interrupt it, so instead I crossed the room quickly and quietly, depositing the grocery bag on my bed.

I didn’t really want to leave Tweek mid-meditation, (I wanted him to actually know where I was going, so he knew about how long I’d be out), so I took my time organizing the groceries on the bedside table, (where our food had been stored ever since we started sharing), and hoped he’d be done by the time it was all over.

After I was finished, I quickly made my way back over to Clyde, who was leaning against the closed door of our dorm room, his arms folded over his chest and his eyes fixed on Tweek with uncertainty and just a little bit of worry. For what reason he was worried, I have no fucking clue.

“Dude . . .” Clyde said under his breath to me when I was standing next to him again, “ _That’s_ your roommate?”

I looked at Tweek with as much indifference as I could. He was pressed tight against the wall, and, while I was busy organizing a few things before leaving, had managed to procure a mug of coffee, and was staring at it with vibrating eyes. He must’ve already made it before Clyde and I showed up and had it resting on the coffee table, because the steam wasn’t billowing like chimney smoke, and he had it clasped tightly in his hands. Not like the heat ever dissuaded him too much, anyway.

I shrugged. “Yeah.”

Tweek looked up when he heard our voices, his eyes wide and wild. Turns out his little meditation session only worked to a certain degree, because he made that terrible screeching noise that almost made me cringe, (key word: almost), and he shifted his gaze rapidly between Clyde and me. “What is he doing here?” he asked, settling his eyes on me.

“Craig said he had to ‘check on you’,” Clyde answered for me, narrowing his eyes. His reaction to the little spaz was shockingly similar to my own the day I met him, but I wanted to smack him in the face for blurting out . . . well, what was the truth, but a truth that should’ve remained silent.

Tweek looked at me, as if he wanted me to confirm the answer. I was fuming that Clyde would just go ahead and _say_ that, because it made it sound like I actually cared about him, and Tweek wasn’t allowed to know about that. Sure, he _needed_ to know that, but then he’d think that he was special to me or something. Which he wasn’t.

But I felt bad for him. Yep. Craig Tucker actually fucking felt _bad_ for someone else. Someone who, logically speaking, didn’t do much to benefit me. I let out a deep breath, and nodded. “Yeah. I came to check on you. I’m going to hang out with Clyde for the afternoon, and I wanted to make sure you were okay before I left.”

I might’ve imagined it, but I’m pretty sure Tweek’s cheeks definitely turned pink as he looked back down at his coffee. “Oh . . .” he stuttered quietly, a thumb stroking the side of the steaming mug. “Okay. I’m fine. Uh . . . thanks, Craig.”

“Okay. Good.” I gestured to Clyde that we were leaving, but before we could get out the door, Tweek called out for me to stop. And he seemed a little panicked, (but when didn’t he?), but I’d grown a . . . soft spot for his little freak-outs. “What is it, Tweek?”

“Uh . . .” he was shaking more than usual, and he was actually standing, on his _feet,_  even though there was someone other than him and I in the room, a feat he hadn’t accomplished yet. “You . . .” His eyes flitted around the room wildly, before he jerked his head back in forth in what I’m assuming was a shake of the head. “Actually, no, no, I can - NGH! - wait until later.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Are you sure?”

“GAH! Yeah,” he said with a sharp nod. “Yeah. Have fun with . . . Clyde?”

“Yeah, Clyde Donovan,” Clyde said, before I could answer. “And Craig and I better leave. I don’t want to be late, but it was nice to meet you, Twitch.”

“GAH! AHH!” Tweek screeched, tugging harshly on his hair. “My name’s not Twitch! It’s Tweek!”

I watched Clyde with narrowed eyes, and saw that he was hiding a smirk. I knew exactly what that asshole was doing, and I was not impressed. “Sorry. I’m not good with names.”

I let out an irritated breath, and glanced back at Tweek. “I’ll be back later. You sure you’re okay?”

He still seemed a little stressed that Clyde ‘couldn’t remember’ his name, but he managed out a nod and said, “GAH! I’ll be fine!”

“Okay,” I said, trying to sound accommodating. I was just a _little_ concerned about him, but he assured me he was fine, so I felt inclined to believe him. “If you need me, just text me.”

“NGH! EHH! Okay!”

And, with that, Clyde and I left my dorm room.  I knew I was in for some kind of taunting, so I said immediately, “What part of ‘don’t be your normal dick self’ escaped your realm of comprehension?”

“Oooh, _realm of comprehension_. That’d make a good sci-fi movie. It’d have to be animated, though.”

“Clyde, dude, seriously,” I said with a frown. “You can make fun of me all you want, but, as a favor to me, leave Tweek alone. It’s not just that he’s a bit of a twitchy spaz, but he’s actually got a fucking anxiety _disorder_. He can’t help it. And it’s a total dick move to make fun of someone for something like that.”

Clyde looked at me with slightly curious, half-suspicious eyes. “Jesus Christ, Middle Town made you into a sensitive pussy.”

I punched him on the arm, and ignored his sudden cry of, “Ow!”. I wasn’t in the mood to put up with his shit. “I will fuck you up, dude.”

“Holy shit, _alright_ ,” Clyde said, rubbing the spot where I’d hit him. He tacked on, his voice low and grumbly, “I’m starting to think Cartman was right.”

I didn’t dignify that with an answer.

* * *

As I came back to my dorm room, I had a bit of a skip in my step. It wasn’t that I was really all that happy or anything, but I was fucking stoked to get away from Clyde and his asshole friends. Token wasn’t even there, and I was actually looking forward to seeing him again. I just wanted to hunker down with my new friend Tweek, a peanut butter sandwich, and a continuation of our Red Racer marathon.

I closed the door behind me, and braced myself for whatever position Tweek might be in. It seemed he was always doing something different whenever I walked in on him, and that time was no exception. He was pacing circles in the room, his hands alternating between clutching at his shirt, and pulling on his hair.

I watched him for a few seconds, enough to see him make an entire loop around the room, before I decided to speak up. “Uh . . . Tweek? Are you okay?”

He jumped, like, three feet in the air. Whatever he was thinking about, his thoughts were louder than the world around him, and he didn’t hear me coming. “GAH! Craig!”

“Yeah,” I said offhandedly, staring at him. “I’m back. I got away as fast as I could. I can only take Clyde and those jackasses in small doses.” I narrowed my eyes at him, and repeated, “Are you okay?”

“GAH! NGH! Remember how I said I wanted to -- NGH! -- ask you something when you got back?” He was still pacing, and my eyes followed him as he repeatedly crossed the floor.

“Yeah?” I said.

“I -- GAH! -- I want . . . no, I _need_ you to walk me to classes from now on!” And then he held his arms in front of his face, like he thought I was going to hit him. _Jesus Christ_ , I had no intention of hitting him. I don’t know why the fuck he thought I did.

I blinked a few times. I wasn’t quite expecting _that_. I looked at him for a moment, before saying, “What?”

“You gotta walk me to class tomorrow!” Tweek exclaimed, rushing over to me, and grabbing hold of my shirt, pulling me uncomfortably close to him. “You gotta, Craig!”

I grimaced, gripping his knuckles and removing them from my body. “No.”

“Please?” he begged, taking another step towards me. Jesus, for somebody who was so anti-physical contact, he sure was touchy.

“No, Tweek,” I said firmly. “I have my own classes to go to, and when I’m not at class, I want to be sleeping. Was class really that bad?”

“Oh, Jesus!” Tweek exclaimed, tugging roughly on his hair and glancing rapidly between my eyes. “It was awful! The teacher called on me three times! And I was so scared, I just sat there!”

 _Huh_ , I thought, oddly amused for the situation. _You’d think the moron would’ve fucking learned not to call this kid out_. But, because I was actually being kind of considerate of how twitchy Tweek seemed, I didn’t say anything.

“The girls called me Tweek the Freak!”

I snorted at that, mostly because I was a little miffed that I hadn’t thought of it first. I was going to say something stupid, like, “Well, it’s not that far off, is it?” but the look of genuine hurt on Tweek’s face stopped me in my tracks before I even took a breath. He was trembling like a kicked chihuahua, his hands gripping at his unevenly-buttoned shirt like it was a lifeline, and he stared up at me, his stupid hazel eyes making me actually feel . . . _bad_. He just fucking stared, without looking away once, like he was trying to figure out if he could trust me or not. And here’s the fucking kicker: I actually _wanted_ him to. I could’ve lived my whole life not giving a single damn if my friends trusted me, but I’d known this spaz for not even a month, and I had started to grow attached to him. God _dammit_ , he was such an asshole. He kept making me feel normal human emotions that I’d successfully avoided all my life, like pity and empathy and shit. It felt weird. My chest hurt.

I sighed and said, “I’m sorry, Tweek. That sounds really shitty, and they can go fuck themselves, but I don’t know what you want me to do about it. It’s not like I have that class with you or anything, and even if I did, it’d be the entire female population of that class up against me.”

Tweek was quiet for a few seconds before saying, “The guys all called me a . . . a twitchy . . . _faggot_. They took my coffee away from me and dumped it all over the ground.” His voice was so fucking broken and nothing like I’d ever heard before, and he stopped looking at me entirely, instead staring down at his fidgeting fingers, his nails untrimmed and picking mercilessly at his skin. “I had to sit through the entire class without coffee. I couldn’t concentrate, and I had a headache the whole time. You know I can’t get through anything without coffee.”

I nodded. Tweek really couldn’t handle social situations, to the point where he had to be hopped up on caffeine in order to focus. He was worse than I was when it came to other people, which really fucking surprised me the more I got to know him.

“So, what do you want me to do?” I asked.

“GAH! I want you to walk me to class,” he said desperately. “If they knew I had friends -”

“We’re friends?”

It was only until after I said that that I realized how fucking rude it was, but it was too late to take it back. Tweek looked heartbroken all over again.

“I didn’t mean it like that,” I said in that voice that I knew calmed him down. “I just meant . . . I didn’t know you considered me a friend.”

Tweek blushed, his head jerking to the side as he let out a noise of complete anxiousness. “I don’t have that many friends, Craig, and you’re really nice to me. You make me feel safe.”

I rolled my eyes. _Jesus, Tweek, a bit melodramatic for a random Sunday in September_. Sure, I was flattered that someone so untrusting actually seemed to trust _me_ , but I could only handle so many emotional confessions before I tapped out. “This is getting way too gay for me.” When he got all nervous looking again, like he thought I was going to say no, I awkwardly patted his shoulder. “If it’ll make you stop bitching, I’ll start walking with you to your classes. And if it comes to it, I can kick their asses if they try to hurt you.

“You’re my roommate,” I added in response to his bewildered look. “If you come back with a black eye and a couple broken bones, I’d feel like a total asshole.” I hoped Tweek realized that by telling him all that stuff, I was also trying to tell him I didn’t actually hate him as much as he seemed to think I did. Sure, I’d never come out and say it, but I got worried about him from time to time.

Alright, confession time over. I fucking hated myself.

“Really?” Tweek asked, his voice all surprised. “You’ll walk with me?”

“Hey, I’m not a complete dick, you know,” I said flatly. “So, now that we got that all cleared up, wanna watch Red Racer?”

That took the frown right off Tweek’s face, and he grinned like a child at me. “Okay, Craig! You put it on, I’ll get my coffee, and we can watch it for however long you want to.”

I didn’t really think that deserved a response, so I nodded, and turned away to comply with his request, when suddenly a pair of trembling arms were wrapped around my waist. I jumped at the sudden contact, and stared down at the five-and-a-half foot tall man-child who had decided it was a good idea to _hug_ me without warning me first. He was resting his head on my chest, holding so tightly and pressing his face so firmly against my sweatshirt that I couldn’t even see his face, just the top of his spiky-haired head. He was breathing really heavily, (although I knew for a fact that he never really _didn’t_ breath heavily), and his heart was pounding so hard I could feel it through our clothing and skin.

I stared at him, unsure really of how to respond, but I brought my hands around him awkwardly, and patted him on the back. I didn’t know what else to do. If I shoved him away from me, he would’ve had an anxiety attack and apologized like he’d killed my guinea pig instead of just invading my personal space. He might’ve even cried, and that was a thought I did _not_ want in my head.

The whole time, I was a little nervous. I was never all that good with physical contact, from anyone, even my parents, and the fact that I . . . didn’t actually mind the hug was a little too much for me to take in.

“Um . . . what are you doing?” I asked blankly, pretending like I wasn’t hugging him back.

“I’m thanking you for helping me,” Tweek said, his voice unusually calm, if a little hesitant for my response to that statement.

“You’re my . . . friend, Tweek,” I said, starting to squirm a little at the extended contact. “Of course I’m going to help you. Now, um . . . can you let go of me? I’m kind of . . . not really used to . . . hugging other people.”

The speed in which Tweek flew away from me was . . . laughable. He was still smiling, but looked a little nervous again, like he thought I was gonna get mad at him. He was trembling like he had been before, and he pulled on his shirt front. “Oh . . . GAH - sorry, Craig.”

The sheepishness in his expression made my heart do some weird shit. I kinda wanted to hug him again, but I ignored that want, and instead ruffled his hair, a move that made him grin at me. “Don’t be sorry,” I said, forcing my voice to it’s monotone again. “I’m just not that good at . . . touching other people, that’s all.”

“GAH! Me neither,” he said quietly, averting his eyes to his feet.

“You seemed just fine clinging to me a few seconds ago,” I said with a grin. I took a massive step back when I saw Tweek pulling back one of his arms, because I really didn’t want anymore bruises on my shoulder. He scowled at me, dropping his hands by his side.

“If you’re going to be an asshole, you gotta take a punch like an asshole.”

Alright, so that came out really fucking weird, but he didn’t seem to see the problem with his statement, and just stood there glaring at me.

“I guess that’s fair,” I said with a shrug. “But if you’re going to spend your time punching assholes, you gotta learn to be faster than that.”

His scowl just got darker, but he shook his head, (and it didn’t even look like a twitch). I wasn't deterred by his anger. Like I've said many times before, he's not exactly the _most_ intimidating guy. He held his glare at me, and said, “Let’s just watch Red Racer.”


	7. The Great Asshole

My alarm went off at exactly 8:45.

Unlike Tweek, I didn’t have to have it at the highest volume that a human ear could withstand before shattering in order for it to wake me up. It was still too quiet to travel to the other side of the dorm room.

I sat up sluggishly, rubbing at my eyes and succumbing to a jaw-aching yawn. Because Tweek and I were both prone to staying up really late, I hadn’t gotten to sleep until about 3:00, maybe 3:30 and I was fucking _exhausted_. Buuuut, I still had to wake Tweek up, and that was an experience all in itself.

I threw the covers off of me, swinging my legs over the side of the bed, and rubbed at my eyes some more. It was really fucking hard to keep them open, and they were stinging vaguely due to my being so tired, but I ignored the feeling and rose to my feet, stumbling a bit when I guess my body decided I had moved too fast. I walked over to Tweek’s bed, leaned over his body, (which was sprawled out like the stereotypical white chalk outline you see at crime scenes), and whispered in a rather hoarse voice,

“ _Tweek_.” I put a gentle hand to his shoulder and shook him lightly. He groaned, and rolled away from me, muttering, “Too much pressure,” under his breath.

I rolled my eyes. Never in a million years would I have guessed that _Tweek_ fucking _Tweak_ was a heavy sleeper, but I had found quickly that it took way too fucking long to wake him up in the morning. I guess I wasn’t as effective as a nuclear alarm, but I guess that couldn’t have been helped.

“Tweek, you gotta wake up,” I said in a louder voice, giving his shoulder another shake, but I was only met with more sluggish shifting and a, “Knock it off, Craig.”

Okay, so I got a little really fucking frustrated, and -- I was _gentle_ , I swear -- took hold of Tweek’s face and turned his head so, if he wasn’t sleeping we would’ve been staring directly at each other. Both hands cupping his cheeks, I used my index finger and thumb to lift his eyelids, exposing hazy, still unconscious hazel eyes. “Tweek,” I said in a louder voice. “If we don’t leave now, we’re going to be late.”

That woke him the fuck up quick. He screeched, “GAH!” way too loud for the hour, and sat up so fast I was almost knocked backward, had I not been gripping his face so tightly.

Tweek sat panting for a few seconds, his eyes flitting around the room frantically, before he found my own gaze, realized his position, and relaxed just a bit.

“NGH! Craig! You scared me!” he said, his voice gravelly with sleep.

I smirked. It usually took me forever to wake up to the point of being able to talk to other humans, but ever since I’d taken to waking him up, my mornings had become much more interesting. “Yeah, I noticed. But you kept telling me to go away, Tweek, what else was I supposed to do?”

“NGH! Not that!” he exclaimed loudly, glaring at me with a twisted frown. “And let go of my face!”

I blinked a few times before realizing that . . . yeah, I was still cupping his cheeks in a way that should’ve been weird a long time ago. But . . . I wasn’t really all that weirded out, and Tweek didn’t look particularly weirded out, either. He just looked miffed, not confused and wary like the situation called for.

I cleared my throat, and straightened up, feeling my cheeks grow a little warm. “Well . . . um, if I’m going to be walking you to classes from now on, we gotta get up a few minutes early so I’m not late. I mean, I’m okay being like five minutes late. If you’re that worried about the other guys, then I don’t want to leave you alone for too long.”

Tweek blushed. “GAH! -- Okay . . . um . . . thanks, Craig.”

I shrugged. “Don’t mention it.” As I looked at him, I felt a part of me grow softer at the sheepish expression on his face, but I just pushed away the feeling. “Seriously. Don’t. I don’t usually do . . . nice things for people, and I don’t really want to think about it too much.”

Instead of answering, Tweek nodded slowly, his eyes drifting shut, and he rubbed at his closed eyelids. He let out a massive yawn -- the kind that actually kind of hurts -- and hunched into himself like a child. I could see him start to fall asleep again -- sitting up -- and I snapped my fingers in front of his face. He must’ve been making up for eighteen years of three-hour-nights, especially because I refused to let him use that annoying as hell alarm clock of his.

“Tweek, you need to stay awake,” I said, turning away from him and rummaging through my drawers, grabbing a random pair of pants and a t-shirt. “We’ve got class in forty-five minutes, and I’m willing to bet you want to drink an entire fucking pot of coffee before we leave.”

Tweek made a faint noise in agreement, and I heard, instead of saw, the springs of his bed shifting as he rose to his feet. I preoccupied myself with getting dressed, dropping my pajama pants around my ankles, and stepping out of them, kicking them to the side to deal with at a later, more convenient time.

I zone out as I get dressed, my mind straying off to thoughts about my bullshit history class, and how I had to face the abortion chick, and the guy whose mother died. God, I hated them so fucking much.

As I gripped the hem of my sleep shirt and lifted it over my head, I thought back to the assignment I had half-assed on Thursday night. It was a paper on the ancient Egyptians and their government system, discussing why the common people accepted pharaohs as near gods. My paper was shit. A C at best. But a C is still passing, and it wasn’t even worth 5% of my grade, so I couldn’t really bring myself to care.

I pulled my shirt on over my head, fixing my chulo when it was knocked slightly askew, and looked back at Tweek. I smirked. Whenever I got dressed, Tweek would cover his entire face with his hands so that I knew for sure he wasn’t looking. I had noticed that about a week into our roommate-ship, and I had yet to draw any attention to it.

But, now that I was sure we were friends, I wasn’t too shy to say,

“Tweek, you can look now.”

“GAH!” he screeched, his entire body jolting, and when he removed his hands from his face, his cheeks were pink. “Sorry.”

I raised an eyebrow at him. “Sorry for not looking?” I asked, my voice a cross between my normal monotone, and distant confusion.

Tweek “GAH!”’d again, his hands reaching up to grasp his hair. “No! I don’t know!”

Because his arms had lifted above his head, I noticed something I hadn’t before, since I’d turned around: Tweek’s shirt was completely unbuttoned. He’d started getting dressed, but, once he noticed I was getting dressed at the same time, he stopped in order to give me _advanced privacy_. I’d never seen more of his skin besides his face, hands, and sometimes this little strip of stomach, because he could never button his long-sleeves correctly. I hadn’t even seen his feet before. (Although, to be fair, he’d never seen mine, either.) The skin of his chest was much like his face: it was extremely pale, and surprisingly soft looking. I don’t know what I had been expecting -- I don’t know if I even had been expecting anything; Tweek’s body wasn’t something I commonly thought of -- but I wasn’t anticipating his skin to be actually . . . not blemished. His hands, on the other hand, were covered in scratches and scabs because, in addition to grabbing his hair and pulling on his shirt, Tweek was also one to pick at his skin. I guess part of me assumed the rest of his body was as flawed as his hands, but it . . . wasn’t.

“GAH! NGH! What are you looking at?!” Tweek exclaimed, his voice shrill and slightly embarrassed. He always got like that when I looked at him for a little too long.

Shut the fuck up right now. It wasn’t something I did knowing I was doing it. It was more of a . . . spacing out, and that was just the place I happened to have been looking thing.

“Aren’t you going to button your shirt?” I asked, lifting my gaze to his eyes and ignoring my warm cheeks.

Tweek narrowed his eyes at me. “Give me a second!”

I held my hands up in surrender. “Alright, Jesus Christ, I won’t rush you. Take your time. I know you can do it.”

He huffed. “Shut up, Craig.”

I smirked, and turned away from him, allowing him the privacy to get ready before we left. It took him like a solid half a minute before he called out, “Okay, done.”

After that, the morning was pretty much silent, except for the occasional dumb comment, Tweek’s GAH!’s, and the coffee maker, on a constant loop. We left about twenty minutes before class started, (our dorm building was in the like the center of the campus, so everything was a pretty easy walk), so that I had time to not be detrimentally late, and Tweek didn’t have to wait around too long by himself.

Tweek and I didn’t say anything as we walked towards one of the science buildings, and Tweek was surprisingly quiet. We stopped short at the front door, and Tweek turned towards me, the expression on his face slightly awkward, uncomfortable, and sheepish.

“Thanks for walking me,” he said quietly, looking at the ground sheepishly.

“Once again, don’t mention it,” I said flatly, adjusting the book bag on my shoulder. “Have a good class or whatever.”

“Yeah, you, too.”

I nodded, but didn’t answer, turning away in favor of the history building.

* * *

As soon as the professor dismissed my class, I was out the door and on my way to the science building I had dropped Tweek off at. That class was bullshit, yet again, with Ms. Abortion going on and on about how mistreated Egyptian laborers were, even though, compared to the treatment of servants under different government systems, Egyptian workers . . . well, they were pretty well off. Had I cared enough, I would’ve considerately informed her that she was an overly-PC bitch that should just take a few mitol, have some chocolate, and go home.

As I made my way down the sidewalk, my mind was pretty much completely blank. I didn’t learn a single fucking thing from that class, and I was actually starting to be a little pissed off about that. I learned more from reading my textbook then I did from the two-and-a-half hour class, and _that’s_ fucking bullshit if I’ve ever seen it.

When I turned the corner towards the science building, I immediately saw Tweek, although he hid himself pretty fucking well. Maybe it was because my mind was so focused on finding the little spaz that I zeroed in on him instantly. He was leaning up against the brick of the building, his textbooks clutched to his chest and his eyes fixed to the ground. I walked towards him, and said, stopping before him, “Hey, Tweek.”

Tweek jumped approximately six feet in the air, with a loud, _"G_ _AH_ _!”_ , and his eyes were wide and frightened as he looked up. When he caught my eye, his face immediately fell into one of relief and gratitude and he said, “Oh . . . Hi, Craig.”

“You ready to go?” I asked, gesturing with my head in the direction of our dorm room. Tweek nodded wordlessly, smiling slightly at me.

Just as Tweek and I were beginning to walk away, I was interrupted by a girl speaking pretty fucking loud, right next to me. Her voice was fucking obnoxious. She had to’ve been a cheerleader in high school. Her voice was all high-pitched, kinda nasally, and loud enough to attract the attention of anybody within a half-mile radius. “Oh my _God_. . . You’re that cute boy from the Main Street Diner!”

I raised an eyebrow. “Um . . . sure. Who are you again?”

“I was your waitress, silly!” Yep, definitely a cheerleader. “You were there with those two gay guys, Wendy Testaburger’s boyfriend, the blonde kid with the pretty-boy face, and that brown-haired man-whore.You ordered a short stack, bacon, and orange juice!”

I stared at her. _How the fuck did she remember that?_ I was so fucking confused. “Um . . . sure . . .” I repeated, slower. “I don’t really remember you,” I said bluntly. I glanced at Tweek to see what he thought of the whole situation, and saw that he was staring fixedly at his books, gnawing nervously on his bottom lip. And, of course, he was shaking. I tried to catch his eye, but he was _determined_ to stay out of the conversation. I didn’t blame him; that girl was annoying as hell.

When I looked back at the girl, I noticed that she wasn’t as excited as she was before. She was even frowning, something that I gathered she didn’t do very often. “You . . . really don’t remember me?”

I shrugged. “Sorry.”

Her shoulders hunched over in disappointment. “Oh.” Just as soon as she fell into a brief depression, her posture suddenly snapped up straight again. “But that’s okay! We should go out sometime! Like I said, you’re cute. And you’ve got that whole mysterious, bad-boy thing going for you -”

Tweek made this really fucking loud screech, and that girl and I looked to him. I somewhat expected it; he had been way too quiet for way too long. The girl, however, raised an eyebrow and frowned. “Is there something I can _help_ you with, Tweek the Freak?”

Tweek started shaking even more noticeably, but didn’t say anything.

 _Shit_ , I thought incredulously. Tweek’s confession from the night before hadn’t really resonated with me until that very moment. We weren’t even in high school anymore, and people were bullying him? I thought that shit stopped when people actually became adults and had actual responsibilities? I mean, I was no saint in high school, (fucking believe me), and I got into more fights than I would care to admit, but I knew that once I graduated, I would be going to college, where the education that matters begins. You couldn’t get away with just picking fights with people in college. You have shit to do, books to read, and papers to write. (Yeah, I know, I actually _did_ my college work.) This bitch even had a job waitressing, and she found the time to make fun of some guy that she knew absolutely nothing about? I mean, I wasn’t Tweek’s biggest fan when I first met him, but I didn’t call him a freak just because he was different.

Well . . . maybe I _insinuated_ that I thought he was a freak. Not intentionally, and I didn’t want him to feel bad or anything. Bitch there _wanted_ him to feel bad. She was actively segregating him from the general population because he was anxious, noisy, and not up to her _standards_ , apparently. Yeah, I wasn’t standing for that. Not on just over five hours of sleep.

I narrowed my eyes at the bitch and folded my arms over my chest. “Shit, you weren’t lying, Tweek. People actually fucking call you that? I thought you were exaggerating.”

“NGH! GAH! No . . .”

Bitch, (the name that I’d decided to give her), turned surprised eyes to me. “What, you know him?”

“He’s my roommate,” I said flatly. Before she had started spouting anti-Tweek speak, I was just completely indifferent to her existence, but I was slowly starting to intensely dislike her.

“And you actually hang around him?” she asked in disgust, folding her arms over her chest.

God, she was such a condescending bitch. “Yes, I hang around him,” I answered defensively. “We’re friends. And I don’t appreciate you acting like a raging bitch to my friend.”

Tweek started shaking violently, and I absentmindedly dropped a hand to his shoulder to calm him down. He was still staring at his textbooks he was clutching in his trembling hands, and that sympathy I wasn’t used to feeling came back full swing.

 _“You_. You’re friends with _him_ _?”_ she asked slowly, like she was clarifying an unfathomable concept. “But you’re . . . cool. And he’s a spaz.”

I expected Tweek to snap his head up and yell at her like he did to me the first time I called him that, but he just shrank into himself, and starting making his twitchy noises at a higher volume. It made my heart do weird shit. I don’t know what the fuck it was, but it made my chest feel hot and heavy, and I glared at the indifferent-looking whore.

“Look, bitch,” I spat at her, “I wasn’t interested in going on a date with you before, but any chance you just had with me is fucking _gone_. Tweek is my friend. Yes, I’m friends with him. No, he’s not a spaz. Bitches like you just make him nervous, because, to put it simply, you’re a _bitch_ , and he, understandably, doesn’t like that. So stay the fuck away from him. And while you’re at it, stay the fuck away from me, too.”

Bitch got this offended, taken aback look on her face, like she wasn’t expecting me to stand up for my friend. She glanced between the two of us, that shock turning pretty quickly into anger, and she harrumphed, turning on her heels and marching away.

I let out a huff of irritated breath and rolled my eyes. “What a bitch,” I noted absently.

“GAH! You didn’t have to -- NGH! -- do that, Craig --”

I frowned at Tweek. He was clutching his textbooks like a lifeline, his knuckles actually white from how tight his grip was, and he was staring determinedly at the ground. No eighteen year old should’ve looked that much like a scared child. I was almost irritated that Tweek thought I _shouldn’t_ have done what I did. “Yes, I did. She was being a bitch to you.”

“Well, yeah, but . . . _everybody_ is, so --”

I squeezed his shoulder tight enough to make him hiss and he glanced up at me. “I don’t want to be friends with people who are bitches to my other friends,” I said sternly.

Despite the fact that I was borderline hurting Tweek from holding so tight, and the fact that I didn’t sound at all compassionate, a small smile formed on Tweek’s face anyway, and he said quietly, “I think she wanted to be a bit more than friends, Craig.”

I shrugged, letting my hand fall from his body, and took a step away, gesturing with my head for him to follow me back to the dorm room. “Sucks to be her, then. If she can be a bitch to you, but kinda nice to me, that just shows how little she knows about me.” As we started walking, I tilted my head curiously at him. “We’re a lot alike, you know.”

Tweek stared at me, one eye half-closed and his lips slightly parted. He was quiet for a moment, before he said, “What?”, in a voice blank enough to make the Tucker in me proud.

I shrugged again. “You and me. We’ve got a lot in common. We both like Red Racer --”

“-- GAH! We’re both _obsessive freaks_ about Red Racer --”

“-- We can exist solely on peanut butter, bread, and granola bars --”

“-- Which is actually _really_ unhealthy, Craig --”

“-- We like staying up late --”

“-- But you _hate_ waking up early --”

“So do you, even though you keep trying to do it. And that doesn’t even matter. We’re not the _same_ person. I hate coffee, and you can’t live without it.” I glanced at the massive travel coffee mug that was sticking out from the crook of his elbow. It looked like it could house a good four cups of coffee, and Tweek didn’t use milk or sugar, so there’d be all that extra room. “And . . . I don’t know, I think it would kinda suck to hang out with another me. We wouldn’t ever talk to each other.”

Tweek grinned. “And I’d hate to hang out with another me. We’d be too scared of each other to say anything.”

I laughed. I could totally picture that. Two Tweeks, staring at each other with wide eyes, too horrified to speak, while huddled underneath separate beds in a dorm room. God, two Tweeks. The racket those two would make . . . “I don’t know, I think that’d be kinda funny. The world could do with more people like you.”

“GAH! What are you _talking_ about?” Tweek asked, his voice all confused and incredulous. “The world would crash and burn if there were more Tweek’s running around!”

“I can guarantee you, every Craig on earth would be plenty happy if there were more Tweek’s running around,” I said, bringing my voice to that classic old monotone. Whenever I said anything of that . . . emotional caliber, (I never would’ve dreamed of saying what I had just said to Tweek to fucking _anybody_ else), I couldn’t let my voice be anything other than blank. He either got indifferent words spoken with emotion, or emotional words spoken with indifference. I refused to combine the two, unless it was two indifferents.

Tweek’s face got all red and he looked down at the ground with a small smile. “NGH! -- There’s only one you, though. I can’t think of anybody that could be as great as you.”

Yep. As much as I never want to fucking say this ever, that actually got to me a little, and I felt my face get really warm. Fucking _really_ , why did Tweek have to be the way he was?

“Tweek, trust me, I’m an asshole.”

Tweek shrugged. “I know you are. But there _are_ a few assholes throughout history that have been great. Genghis Khan was great --”

I groaned, rolling my eyes. “Horrible example, Genghis Khan raped women and was a horrible leader --”

“GAH! -- But he still did great things, even if they _were_ horrible. Thomas Edison was an asshole, but he was a great inventor --”

“Thomas Edison stole ideas from plenty of people, and just got the credit for them --”

“NGH! See! Asshole! What about Frank Sinatra?”

I tilted my head in thought. “Total misogynistic, racist asshole, but he helped get Kennedy elected.” I nodded my approval. “Okay, that one works.”

“And Dr. Seuss was an asshole!”

I blinked. “. . . The children’s author?”

Tweek glanced at me sharply. “He cheated on his wife!”

 _Holy shit_ , I thought, amusement pulling at the corners of my mouth. He said it so seriously, like Dr. Seuss’ twisted sense morality, and lack of fidelity actually affected him. “So . . . you’re comparing me to Dr. Seuss?”

I guess Tweek didn’t really think his verbalized comparisons through very well, because I was nothing like Dr. Seuss. I would _never_ cheat, and never _had_ cheated. (I hadn’t ever had a girlfriend, so it never really came up, but I was firm-standing on sticking with one person at a time.) I also was not the biggest fan of children. Sure, they were okay when I was a kid, but the older I got, the more obnoxious they became. And . . . I didn’t know much about Dr. Seuss, so maybe he wasn’t that big into kids, either, (which was a thought that sounded weird as soon it crossed my mind), so maybe we did have that in common.

Tweek clearly noticed the inconsistencies, because he closed one eye and studied me. “Would you ever cheat on your wife of forty years?”

I raised an eyebrow at him. “Um . . . no,” I said. “I’m not that much of an asshole, Tweek.”

Tweek seemed pleased with my answer. “Do you see yourself prone to alcoholism?”

 _What the fuck?_  I would’ve questioned him on his persistent questions, but I figured I’d just answer him and pretend like he wasn’t being his weird ass self. “I mean, I drank a lot of vodka in high school, but I could handle _not_ drinking it. It was more of a . . . hobby. Not an addiction.”

Tweek seemed even more pleased with my answer. “GAH! Well you’re not much like Dr. Seuss at all then.”

I smirked. “Good, I guess.”

“Craig! Hey! Hi, Craig!”

I blinked a few times at having suddenly heard my name being called, and let my eyes drift in the direction of the voice. I was . . . actually kinda disappointed to see Clyde, standing on the other side of the road, waving at me with his entire arm. I rolled my eyes, glancing at Tweek out of the corner of my eye. His smile had been wiped clear from his face. He clearly had remembered Clyde from the day before, and the fact that Clyde very obviously purposefully forgot Tweek’s name, just so he could be an asshole to someone he immediately ‘didn’t like’. But, that wasn’t the only reason Tweek had suddenly clammed up just then . . .

I didn’t understand until I saw the other people standing next to Clyde.

Oh, fucking perfect. The entire asshole quartet was with him. Perfect.

God-fucking-damn it, fucking _perfect_.

I sighed, turning to Tweek and saying, “Those are my old South Park . . . goddamn it, they weren’t really friends, but I don’t know what the hell else to call them. We can just ignore them if you want.”

“GAH! NGH!” Tweek twitched violently, his head whipping to the side so fast I momentarily thought he snapped his neck. “That’s okay. I can just get back to the room by myself --”

I frowned. “Tweek, you were panicking about walking by yourself yesterday. We can ignore them.” I put a hand on his shoulder, and started walking him in the direction away from Clyde and the others, but Clyde just called out again,

“Craig, you asshole, we’re over here!”

I snorted. Dumbass thought I didn’t see him.

I would’ve kept walking, and Tweek seemed all-too-eager to leave the situation, too, but then Clyde tacked on, loudly, “Hey, it’s Twitch!”

I stopped in my tracks, and glared over at Clyde. He had a smug little smirk on his face, and elbowed Stan, who was standing beside his girlfriend, his arm around her shoulders. He said something to him that I couldn’t hear, gesturing with his head in Tweek’s direction. I guess whatever he said was a fucking _riot_ , because Stan started chuckling, staring at Tweek for a second before nodding in agreement.

My eyes narrowed, and I glanced at Tweek out of the corner of my eye. “They’re talking about you.”

Okay, so maybe not the _best_ thing to tell the most paranoid guy on the planet, but I felt like I needed to give my sudden, very obvious irritation some context. I know for a fact that I’m not an easy guy to read, but I can fucking _radiate_ annoyance, even when I don’t mean to. It can be so strong, that sometimes just mere indifference can come off as annoyance. Sometimes, that’s a good thing, like in that one particular moment.

Tweek’s eyes widened, and he started trembling. “GAH! NGH! EHH! Really? Oh man, _why?_   I didn’t even do anything!”

“Well . . . they’re assholes,” I said, looking back over at the group. Tweek and I had been standing in one place too long, because the entire South Park gang had started crossing the road. In one horde of humans, I saw Clyde, Stan, Wendy, (the last two were suction-cupped to each other side, and were nothing but smiles), Kenny, Kyle, Cartman, (the last two were suction-cupped to each other’s side, and were nothing but eye rolls and smug smirks), Token, and Bebe. While I _had_ seen those guys hanging out with new people I didn’t recognize, they most definitely had a habit of gravitating towards each other, and I guess the South Park curse hadn’t exactly left my system, because I, against all logic, had been spending time with them, too. Not a whole lot, but more than you think. “And I guess they’re coming over here. I could try sneaking you away, but I think they’d probably just chase us. You up for meeting new people today?”

“GAH! _Not really!_ \--”

“That’s the spirit.”

Tweek didn’t have any room to answer, because the South Park cult had made their way in front of us, all with varying expressions on their faces. Clyde had that dumb ‘mischievous’ look on his face, and he was most definitely planning some way to mess with Tweek. Bebe, Stan, Kyle, Kenny, and Token all had matching looks of actually friendly curiosity. Wendy had an overly kind smile on her face, and Cartman looked downright _scary_. It was him I was most scared of. He would spare Tweek no mercy. He wouldn’t stop until Tweek was fully panicking, and I didn’t want to subject Tweek to that kind of bullshit. Not if I could help it.

I’ll admit, I had grown . . . just a little protective of him, but that was mostly because of his confession from the day before, about how other guys and chicks mistreated him. I didn’t believe him at first, but then Ms. Lip Ring came into the picture, and I realized that, if the girls actually _did_ call him Tweek the Freak, then the guys _actually_ cornered him and taunted him. I was in enough fights to know how one starts, and a group of guys cornering a tiny little thing like Tweek was textbook.

“Well, well, well,” Cartman said, smiling that ‘innocent’ smile that never fooled anyone. Not even a stranger: the expression on Tweek’s face clearly said that he didn’t trust that fatass. “Tweek Tweak. To what does Craig owe this pleasure?”

I frowned, narrowing my eyes at him as a warning not to be an asshole. I figured it probably wouldn’t work, but it never hurt to try. “ _Tweek_ ,” I stressed his name, shooting a look in Clyde’s direction, “Is my roommate. We’re heading back to our room now.”

“ _GAH_!”

I swear, I wanted to pound Cartman’s face in when he made this amused face as a response to Tweek’s little spasm. But I kept my cool. Fucking barely.

“You apparently already know Cartman, from your . . . physics class, right?” I realized that Tweek probably wouldn’t have been able to nod even if he wanted to, so I moved on. “You already met Clyde. The guy in the green hat is Kyle. _The_ Kyle. The one that thought it was a good idea to date the fatass next to him.” I ignored Cartman’s little indignant, “Hey!” and continued, gesturing in the other’s direction. “The guy with the black hair is Stan, and that’s his girlfriend, Wendy.”

“Hi, Tweek!” she said cheerfully, waving at the horrified look on Tweek’s face. He just barely managed to wave back. If I wasn’t so pissed off, I actually might’ve laughed at him. He just looked so fucking uncomfortable.

“The blonde one is Kenny, the other blonde one is Bebe, and the black one is Token.” I nodded at Token, and he smiled at me. _Why the fuck was I best friends with_ Clyde _, and not_ Token _?_ I thought with a middle finger raised to my younger self. Token was much calmer, reasonable, and, not to mention, not a complete and utter dick just ‘cause. “Token was one of my only friends back in South Park.”

“I thought we were friends!” Wendy instantly exclaimed, her voice incredulous and almost desperate. I felt a little bad, because she did look a little sad that I didn’t consider her a friend of mine, but she could stuff it, because she was, is, and had been dating my arch nemesis. That was fraternizing with the enemy, and I wouldn’t tolerate it.

“No, I hated you,” I answered with a shrug. “Don’t feel bad about it, though.”

“How can I _not_ feel bad about it?” she asked, like the very notion was absurd. “I had the biggest crush on you in middle school!”

I blinked at her. I didn’t know about that, but middle school was more than four years ago from that day, so I didn’t really give a shit. I was a little surprised, (and, just to be an asshole, a little happy), to see Stan’s face, (which had been pleasant, content, and happy to be around his girlfriend), fall into a heartbroken frown. He removed his arm from Wendy’s shoulder, folding his arms over his chest and staring at her with narrowed eyes. “Wendy, _you and I_ were dating in middle school!”

She shrugged. “Stan, that was a long time ago,” she said. “Craig and I were assigned to do this history project together -- I don’t even remember what it was about -- and when we went to his bedroom to work on it, he let me play with his guinea pig. He told me that he hardly ever let anyone touch her. He made me feel special.”

This did nothing to make Stan feel better, and everybody could tell. His eyes just turned to narrower slits. “Is _that_ why you broke up with me that time?”

“He was very persuasive --”

“So _that’s_ why you wouldn’t leave me alone for, like, an entire month that year,” I said flatly. “Look, the only reason I let you anywhere near Stripe is because I was a lazy asshole and wanted to get out of as much work as I could.  And you’re a chick. Chicks like small animals.” The most scandalized look overtook Wendy’s face, but I rolled my eyes. “Don’t give me that. I was fourteen, hated history, and was given the perfect partner. It worked, didn’t it?”

“Forget that shit,” Cartman said, before Wendy could start bitching, or Stan could start publically stirring shit in their relationship. “I want to learn more about Tweek.”

 _Well, at least he got his name right ._. . I thought, my eyes flicking to the easy-going smile on Cartman’s face.

Nope, still wasn’t buying it.

“GAH! NGH! EHH! What do you -- AHH! -- _whatdoyouwanttoknow_?”

Jesus Christ, he was freaking the fuck out. I lifted my hand to pat him on the shoulder, but I remembered where I was, (in the presence of someone else _other_ than Tweek, which in itself wasn’t all that bad, but it was the _South Park_ guys, and _Cartman_ ), and let it fall to my side again. I could _feel_ Tweek vibrating next to me. Terror was rolling off him in waves. I was just hoping against fucking _hope_ that Cartman wasn’t going to be an asshole.

No such luck, I guess, because his ‘charming’ smile never left his face, and he coated his words with, what I’m sure he thought was, silky velvety seduction. “I want to know _everything_ ,” he said.

. . . Nope, still not fucking buying it.

Unfortunately, (or I guess _technically_ fortunately, it’d been awhile since I’d last been arrested), I didn’t have the chance to smack Cartman in the face for being an asshole, because Kyle pretty much did it for me, just with less violence.

“Cartman, don’t be a dick,” he said firmly, taking a step away from his boyfriend so that they weren’t pressed flush against each other anymore. He turned his attention to Tweek, who was letting out all his little anxious noises every once in awhile. Something told me I’d get more than a couple punches on the shoulder when we got back to our dorm room. “Tweek, right? Word of advice: don’t listen to Cartman, ever. He’ll try to embarrass you, taunt you, or provoke you into committing some kind of crime just because he knows he can. He’s not just an asshole, he’s a _sadistic_ asshole. Just . . . don’t even talk to him unless I’m around, actually.”

“GAH!” was all Tweek managed as a response.

“Yeah, Kyle’s got Cartman wrapped around his finger,” Kenny said with a laugh.

“I’d like to think so,” Kyle said, ruffling Cartman’s messy brown hair, and smirking when Cartman grunted and tried to smack Kyle’s hand away.

“Goddamn fun-sucking Jewrat,” he muttered under his breath. “Look, if I can’t mess with him, then what’s his point?”

I actually felt something hot and angry go rushing from my heart to my fingertips. Something about what he said then pissed me the fuck off, but -- some-fucking-how -- I managed to reel it in enough for Kyle to take over for me. Again.

“Not everybody’s ‘point’ revolves around you, fatass,” Kyle said with an eye roll. “Now, before you completely ignore me and start torturing this poor guy for your amusement, why don’t we head back to our dorm room?” Kyle’s face pinkened, and he leaned close to Cartman, whispering something in his ear, and rolled his eyes again when Cartman’s entire face lit up.

“I revoke my last statement,” he said eagerly, wrapping an arm around Kyle’s waist. “You’re a goddamn _cock_ -sucking Jewrat.”

“You’re pushing your luck, fatass,” Kyle mumbled, his face scarlet, but he allowed himself to be led down the sidewalk in the opposite direction. I knew exactly what the fuck they were off to do -- I think the entire fucking world did, _including_ Tweek -- but I wanted to get rid of that moment from my memory in it’s entirety, because it was the first time I was faced with the mental image of the two of them . . . in a less-than PG situation, and just . . .

. . . ugh. . .

As an upside, Tweek seemed to relax just a little bit after Cartman left, but he was still _way_ more on edge than I was used to him being. His textbook was pinned to his chest tightly, (for the _second_ time that day, since I’d walked him to class), he was staring anxiously at the ground, and his bottom lip was being _massacred_ between his teeth.

“Tweek, are you okay?” I asked flatly, even though I already fucking knew the answer.

“GAH! NGH!” Tweek glanced up at me with wide eyes. “Craig, man, this is _way_ too much pressure!” he hissed to me.

Wendy made a cooing noise, and when my gaze flicked to her, she had her hands clasped over her heart and stars in her eyes. Odds are, she saw Tweek as her new favorite ‘plaything.’ She was _obsessed_ with small, cute things. “Tweek, you don’t have to be nervous around us. We’re not scary, I promise!”

Stan huffed, folding his arms over his chest like a bratty kid. “Watch it, Tweek. Say the wrong thing, and she’ll be hooked on _you_ next,” he spat bitterly.

Wendy’s response was immediate. Her eyes lost their adoring gleam, and turned very quickly to daggers as she turned to glare at her . . . well, I didn’t think he was going to be her boyfriend for much longer. “Stop being a child, Stan. My crush on Craig was a long time ago, and it didn’t even matter, anyway, because he didn’t feel the same way.”

Stan turned his body entirely to her, leaning forward so that he was close to her face. “Like him not feeling the same way _matters_ , Wendy! You still broke up with me because of it!”

“It wouldn’t have been fair to stay with you if my heart wasn’t completely invested in the relationship!” Wendy retorted, matching his body language and continuing her vicious glare. “And why are you complaining now? Middle school was four years ago!”

“If it can happen when we’re fourteen, then it can happen when we’re eighteen, too!” Stan said, his voice rising in volume. “God, Wendy, that is _so_ like you! Break up with your boyfriend that you’ve had since you were nine, because some other boy let you play with his guinea pig!”

“That’s probably the best euphemism I’ve ever heard,” Kenny interjected with a laugh.

The fight continued as if Kenny hadn’t even interrupted them. “It wasn’t just about the fucking guinea pig!” Wendy shouted back. “He was really nice to me!”

“Nice? Craig’s an _asshole!”_

Kenny looked at me, smirking, with amused eyes. “Do you _often_ let girls play with your guinea pig?”

I ignored him.

“He was nicer to me than you’ve _ever_ been!” Wendy said wildly, stamping her foot in her anger. I could see in her posture that she wanted nothing more than to sock Stan right in the nose, but she, (and this is something to admire, because I definitely wouldn’t have been able to), held back.

“Well if I’m so _horrible_ to you, then maybe we shouldn’t even _be_ dating!”

“Maybe you’re right!”

Stan rolled his eyes. “According to _you_ , _that’d_ be a first.”

“I should’ve broken up with you a _long_ time ago!”

“You did! What you _should’ve_ done was stay the fuck away from me!”

Wendy gasped, her eyes widened and her jaw falling slack. They stared at each other for a few seconds, before Wendy brought a hand back, and slapped Stan in the face. Hard. His head flew to the side and the slap sound almost sounded _fake_ , that’s how loud it was.

After the slap, Wendy spun on her heels and ran away, her long black hair flowing behind her. It was quiet for a moment, before Bebe sighed and said,

“I should . . . probably go after her.” She turned to Tweek, smiled, said, “It was nice to meet you, Tweek. Maybe I’ll see you around,” and then turned away to follow after her best friend.

Yeah, the group of people who hadn’t left to either go have sex, or mourn the end of an already-rickety relationship were thrust into some of the most awkward silence I think I’d ever experienced in my life. It felt like forever before Kenny cleared his throat, and said,

“So . . . what now?”

Stan sighed, dropping his head into his hands. “I’m going to find Kyle. I need my super best friend. And to get drunk.” Jesus Christ, dramatic much?

“Uh, I don’t think you want to follow Kyle,” Clyde said, his face scrunching up in disgust.

“Yeah, do you really want to go through that all over again?” Kenny added.

Stan’s head snapped up, and his face was green, his eyes wide, and he bit hard on his bottom lip. He shook his head, rubbing his stomach like he was pleading with the bile inside him to stay where it was.

“Throw up and I’m leaving,” I said blankly, staring at him with indifferent eyes. As far as I was concerned, his break up wasn’t relevant to me. In fact, had they not stopped Tweek and I as we were walking back to our dorm room, they’d probably still be dating.

“Craig, you’re being insensitive,” Kenny said with a frown, but as we made eye contact, he nodded in a way that told me maybe he wasn’t too sympathetic, either. I mean, from what Kyle and Cartman were talking about when we had lunch together that first time, Stan and Wendy had broken up at least fifteen times since I’d moved away. I’m sure it got old for the people around them, because, chances were, they were just going to get back together at some point, and pretend like the break-up didn’t even happen until some other dumb problem came up. They were in probably the most immature relationship I think I’d ever seen in my life. They broke up after every fight, but didn’t acknowledge the fact that, just because they were fighting, didn’t mean they had to leave each other. It meant they were fucking _fighting_ , and that eventually, one of them would apologize, and they’d be fast at it again.

I’d never had a girlfriend, but even _I_ knew their relationship sucked.

“When have you known me to not be insensitive?” I asked flatly.

I saw Clyde’s posture straighten out of the corner of my eye. “I know!” he exclaimed. “When you went back to your dorm room to ‘check on Tweek’ before you could come hang out with us!”

I huffed at the example, ignoring the heat in my cheeks as I averted my eyes. “That’s different.”

“How?” Clyde asked smugly.

“Because Stan isn’t my friend,” I said simply, catching Stan’s eye and shrugging. “No offense.”

“None taken,” he muttered.

I expected Kenny to say something, fucking _anything_ , just to make fun of me for caring about one of my friends, but he was oddly quiet, glancing between Tweek and I with a contemplative look on his face. The only sound he made was a distant, probably unconscious, “Hmm . . .”

It was at that point that Tweek screeched, and it was fucking _loud_. I glanced over at him, and his entire face was red, and he was back to looking at the ground again. I instantly took that as a sign that he wanted to leave, (well, more than he wanted to leave before), and I was oh-too happy to comply.

“You want to head back to our dorm room now?” I asked him.

He didn’t say as much in actual, English words, but the anxious spasms that I’d come to be quite familiar with. “GAH! NGH! EHH!” followed by frantic head nods. A response like that wasn’t technically polite in modern society, but, like me, I guess Tweek just didn’t fucking care. All he did care about was leaving, and I respected the hell out of that.

“Wait, we were just about to go back to Stan’s dorm room and get shit-faced,” Kenny said, gesturing with a thumb in Stan’s direction. “Tradition.”

“As much as I don’t usually condone this sort of shit, Kenny is the absolute best person to get drunk with,” Token said seriously. Kenny beamed proudly. “Even _I’m_ going.”

“Absolutely not,” I said, shaking my head.

“Why not?” Clyde whined.

I looked at Tweek, but he was still staring at the ground. I sighed. “First of all, it’s a Monday, and it’s only noon. I’ve never been a day drinker.” I paused, before adding, “That’s a lie. I’ve never been a day drinker with other people.”

“Well, what about Twitch?” Clyde asked. I glared at him, and he rolled his eyes. “I mean, _Tweek_. What if he wants to get drunk with us?”

I frowned. “That was my second of all. I highly doubt he wants to.” But I knew I’d just get shit for ‘answering for him’ or something dumb like that, so I looked at him with a raised eyebrow. “Tweek, do you want to go drinking with these assholes?”

“GAH! NGH! EHH! No thank you!” he screeched, shaking his each emphatically again.

“There you go,” I said flatly. “Tweek and I will just be going now. Have fun. Don’t die.”

Before they could argue, I tapped Tweek briefly on the shoulder, (as much physical contact as I was willing to have with the eyes of four assholes watching us), and started walking away from them. I glanced over my shoulder to make sure Tweek was following me, and was pleased to see that he had hurried after me, a look of complete and utter relief on his face.

As soon as we fell in step with each other, he looked at me, his eyes wide, and exclaimed, “NGH! -- That was _so much fucking pressure!"_

I shrugged. “You survived, though, didn’t you?”

“GAH! _Barely_ _!_ Have they always been like that?” he asked, as if the very thought was something to dread.

I nodded. “Yeah. They’re assholes.”

Tweek bit his lip. “And not even the great kind,” he said under his breath.

I smirked. He had a point.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright, so the entire South Park gang has met Tweek. I was a little worried about their interactions, so please let me know how I did!


	8. Breaking Red Racer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I know, I'm super late with this, and it is definitely not my best chapter, but I felt like there needed to be a chapter explaining their upgrade to bestfriendship, and this was the best way to do it. Thanks for your patience with me, there really isn't an excuse as to why this is so late. All I can say is, my fall semester just started, and I've been working a bit more than I was before, so there you go.

As much as I considered Tweek to by my very good friend, I didn’t really know all that much about him, besides the fact that he drank a lot of coffee, was anxious all the time, and loved Red Racer as much as I did. That was a stark difference from how intimately I knew literally everybody from South Park. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: people knew way too goddamn much about everybody else there. Mostly, I didn’t care enough to actively try to remember the shit that happened around me, but it was impossible _not_ to know. The weird thing about Tweek was that I was unnerved that I knew very, very little about who he was as a person. I mean, I could anticipate Tweek’s reactions to a lot of shit that happens, but I didn’t know what his parents were like, or what his favorite food was, or what he did for fun back in Denver, or if he had many friends. I could give you the history of Clyde Donovan’s life, but I couldn’t even fucking tell you Tweek’s favorite color.

How fucking sad is that?

And so I decided that that needed to change.

Tweek and I were in the middle of our standard Red Racer marathon, (we’d made it to season ten, and were also revelling in the fact that we didn’t have any classes, as it was Saturday), when, in between episodes, as the credits started rolling, I figured it’d be a good time to talk. I looked over at him, taking in his at-ease profile, watching intently at the tv screen as the catchy theme song played through the names of the actors and music and costume directors. He looked deep in thought, so I interrupted that by asking, “Have you noticed that the only thing we do when we hang out is watch Red Racer, and talk about Red Racer, and eat granola bars? I mean, I don’t really know anything about you.”

“GAH! Well, what do you want to know?” he asked, as casually as I’m sure he was capable of sounding. He looked extremely relaxed, laying on his stomach with his head propped up in his palms, leaning on his elbows, his feet kicking behind him. Like a child.

“I don’t know,” I said blankly, sitting up slightly. “What’s your favorite color?”

“NGH! Green. Like my shirt. What about you?”

“I like blue. Like my shirt.”

Tweek grinned. “And your pants, and your hat, and your eyes. Do you color coordinate?”

“My hat’s called a chullo, and no, I don’t.”

The laugh that left Tweek’s mouth could only be described as a giggle. “Sure seems like you do.”

I huffed, not taking too kindly to Tweek’s teasing. It brought me back to my metrosexual days, and ever since that whole fad ended, I tried so fucking hard to pretend like that entire week didn’t even happen at all. “Oh, yeah? Well you can’t button your shirt up the right way.”

It wasn’t the most sophisticated retort, nor the wittiest by any means, but it did the job, because Tweek’s smile immediately dropped and he frowned at me. “Yeah, ‘cause I’m always shaking. What’s your excuse for wearing blue all the time?”

I shrugged. “I like the color blue. I don’t really like any other colors. That’s my excuse.”

“You’ve worn that hat -- excuse me, _chullo_ \-- everyday since I met you,” Tweek said flatly, craning his head to stare blankly into my eyes. “I don’t even know what color hair you have.”

I lifted up one of the flaps so that he could see some of the hair around my ears. “Black.”

Tweek rolled his eyes. “Figures.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked, somewhat defensively, even though I didn’t really know what I was defending.

“I don’t know what I was expecting,” Tweek explained, settling back down on his stomach and facing forward. “I mean -- GAH! -- you’re too . . . bland to have blonde hair, and too, uh . . . boring to have red hair, so I kinda thought you’d either have brown hair or black hair.”

I raised an eyebrow at Tweek’s thought process. “Tweek, hair color has nothing to do with personality.”

Tweek tilted his head in thought. “GAH! -- Well, not usually, but I’m pretty good at guessing shit like that. Like . . . Okay, Kyle’s got red hair, doesn’t he?”

“Um . . . yeah?” I said slowly. “How’d you know that? Kyle never takes off his hat.”

Tweek shrugged as well as he could, considering he was laying on his stomach. He was fighting off a smirk, I could fucking tell. “I don’t know. I just guessed ‘cause he gets mad so easily.”

I stared at him. “Are you fucking joking? That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.”

Tweek looked over at me and laughed happily. “No. I told you, I’m good at this sort of stuff.”

Okay, so I didn’t believe that for a second, but I honestly didn’t care enough to call him out on it. “What would you have done if I was blonde?”

“Probably have a heart attack, because I literally _cannot_ picture you as a ditzy blonde.”

I narrowed my eyes. " _You’re_ a ditzy blonde.”

He narrowed his eyes and matched my half hearted glower. “And you’re an antisocial, iron-hearted douchebag.”

“Then why are we friends?” I asked flatly, folding my arms over my chest.

“Because I’m kinda an antisocial douchebag, too,” he explained, any anger from his voice having evaporated. “I’m just not iron-hearted.”

“You’re right, spazzes can’t be iron-hearted,” I answered, smirking at him.

He scowled at me. “I’m not a fucking spaz, Craig!”

“Of course you’re not.”

“I’m _not!"_

“Sure, whatever you say.”

“ _Shut the fuck up, Craig!"_

I laughed at him. It was so much fun watching him get all riled up. “Okay, okay, I’ll stop. It’s really amusing to see you get all angry.”

Tweek huffed. “GAH! -- Well, _I_ don’t think it’s very amusing.”

“I don’t think that really matters; I don’t make fun of you for you, I make fun of you for me,” I said in as monotone a voice as I could. His face got all pink, and he sat up completely, sitting on his knees with his hands in fists propping him forward.

“You’re an asshole, you know that, Craig?”

“I know, you tell me that pretty much every day.”

“Good. I was just making sure you were aware.”

I rolled my eyes. He was such a teenage girl sometimes. “Don’t you find that. . . I don’t know, weird?”

Tweek looked at me. “Do I find what weird? You? Because if you’re talking about you, then yes.”

“No, smartass, I mean the fact that you and I have been friends for a while and don’t know anything about each other.”

“GAH! Not really,” he said, his posture relaxing, so that he was reclining back on his ankles. “I don’t like it when people know anything about me.”

I nodded. “Yeah, me neither.”

“Then why are you so wrapped up in the fact that you and I are pretty much strangers?”

That made me stop for a second. Because it was a question that even I had been unable to answer.

“Uh . . . well, ‘cause we’re, like . . . always around each other, I guess,” I said awkwardly. “Don’t you think it’s . . . weird?”

Tweek was quiet for a moment, and I watched the stream of emotions flit across from his face, from surprise, to confusion, back to surprise, and finally falling onto a weird thoughtful expression that I’d never seen on his face before. He had probably five facial expressions for any given situation, so I wasn’t surprised that I wasn't used to every single one, but he did look oddly calm.

“I guess so,” he said after a very long beat of silence.

“So let’s get to know each other,” I said blankly.

“GAH! NGH! How?”

Another question to which I had no answer. “I don’t know.”

There was a beat of painfully awkward silence before Tweek said, his voice flat, “Then what the fuck are you bringing it up for?”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “Because I’ve been thinking about it for a few days, and it was bothering me.”

“GAH! Well, let’s just play ‘would you rather,’ then.”

I stared at him for a second before asking blankly, “Are we thirteen-year-old girls?”

Tweek glared at me. “If you have a better suggestion, I’d love to hear it, asshole.”

“Alright, alright, fine,” I said, rolling my eyes. “We’ll play ‘would you rather.’ But you have to go first.”

“GAH! _Why_?” Tweek asked, his voice just slightly more anxious than it had been before.

“Because I’m the least creative person you’ve ever met,” I said, folding my arms over my chest. “So go, if we’re playing.”

Throughout our little game of fucking ‘ _would you rather_ ,’ (Jesus Christ, it was so fucking stupid), I’d learned . . . many things about my roommate. Apparently, he likes space, too, which I found . . . a little weird, because space is fucking creepy. Even _I’ll_ admit that, so I figured Tweek would be too scared of it to really _want_ to know about it, but it turns out, he actually really likes it. He said he used to stargaze a lot when he was a kid, and can point out fifteen different constellations on a clear enough night. That was pretty fucking impressive, if I do say so myself. I can point out all of the constellations visible in the Northern hemisphere, and can name all the other ones that you can’t really see in Colorado, or Nebraska, but that was because I was a little way too obsessed with outer space. His favorite planet is Pluto, and always had been, even though there was a pretty good chunk of time where it wasn’t considered a planet. He got so fucking offended when I mentioned that to him, and insisted that it had always been a planet to him. God, I laughed my ass off at that.

I also learned that he apparently thinks there’s such thing as . . . Underpants Gnomes? Like . . . what the actual fuck? That’s some South Park shit right there, and he got probably the blankest, most void of emotion look I’d ever given anyone in my life. He ranted for a solid five minutes about how they were real, how they only come out at 3:30 in the morning, and how relieved and grateful he was that they hadn’t found where he was yet. I had to stop him when his ramblings got a little too crazy for me.

He’s never been to the ocean before. He said he’d be too afraid of drowning or being eaten by a shark to even step foot on a beach. That didn’t surprise me at all. He does like lakes, though, and used to just sit on his Uncle Bryan’s boat all the time, staring at the water.

He hates cats, and isn’t much of a dog person, either. He likes hamsters, guinea pigs, and goldfish, though. Glad we agreed on that, because I might’ve had to drop him as a friend if he didn’t like guinea pigs. When I told him that, he freaked out so bad, that I had to tell him I was _just_ joking just so that he’d calm down.

I totally fucking lied.

He’s only seen one horror movie before, and it was _The Exorcist_. Apparently, his parents made him watch it when he was fourteen, because they claimed it was a right of passage into manhood, because that movie is the greatest horror movie ever made. He said he had nightmares every night for nine months, and his parents would just lock their bedroom door at night, so that he couldn’t wake them up whenever he would go to them about it.

That surprised me. I didn’t think parents like that existed.

Tweek learned some shit about me, too. More than I really felt comfortable with, but I really was pretty close to him, even before we shared shit about each other. He learned the true extent of how I felt about space, how it was my favorite thing in the whole world, (an oxymoron that made him snort in amusement). I told him my favorite planet was Saturn, mostly because it made the creepiest noises out all the planets in the solar system. I explained the radio emissions from the Cassini spacecraft, and how it picks up plasma waves that are extremely high-pitched and sound almost like when you shake laminated paper and it makes _that_ noise. Tweek gave me this confused look when I tried to explain it, so I youtube searched the sounds and showed it to him. I had to shut it off after a minute because he got this scared look on his face, and, even though he _claimed_ he wasn’t creeped out, I didn’t believe him.

He found out that how much I love guinea pigs, and that one of my biggest dreams was having an entire family of guinea pigs one day. Tweek called me a fucking nerd because of it, but he was smiling at the same time, so I didn’t take it personally.

I told him about my time in Peru, and how the reason I was there was probably the most influential reason of why I hated Stan and Kyle and Kenny and Cartman so much. I left out the part about me being the ‘chosen one’, and being able to shoot lasers out of my eyes. He . . . didn’t need to know _that_ much.

It wasn’t until there was a brief lull in the conversation when I realized that it was fucking _dark_ outside. Like, no light at all. (At some point, I guess Tweek had turned on a light, but I was too wrapped up in our conversation to really notice.) I tapped the home button on my phone, and my eyes bugged out when I saw the time. “Oh, shit, it’s four am,” I said incredulously, blinking down at the blinding flashing light from my phone screen. That wasn’t a particularly worrying thought; the next day was Sunday, and we didn’t really have anything that important to do, (except, I maybe needed to run to the grocery store; after that night, we were completely out of food), but it was just . . . a little surprising.

“Jesus Christ!” Tweek exclaimed, and another light came on, indicating that he was checking his phone to make sure I wasn’t lying to him. “Should we sleep?”

I tilted my head a few times, and blinked rapidly. It was something I’d done since I was a kid to test if I was tired enough to be able to sleep. It was basically a way to weigh your eyelids, see how easily they drooped, and my eyes drooped immediately, so I nodded. “Yeah, I guess so.”

After that, Tweek and I took turns getting changed into our pajamas, and climbed into our respective beds.

I was a few blinks from sleeping when I heard Tweek’s voice from across the room, and it was the calmest I’d ever heard him in all the time I’d known him. “Hey, Craig?” He even sounded like a normal person, and my heavy eyes blinked open in the attempt to pay attention to his words. I didn’t realize how fucking tired I was until I tried to focus on something.

“Yeah, Tweek?”

“I didn’t really guess that Kyle had red hair,” Tweek said quietly, and when I looked over at him, he was turned towards me, curled into the fetal position, and there was a smug look on his close-eyed face.  “Cartman told everybody on the first day of physics.”

I rolled my eyes, smirking tiredly as my eyes closed again. “Typical,” I said, my voice slightly slurred in my exhaustion.

Tweek did his giggle-laugh, but didn’t say anything.

It only took me like a minute to fall asleep, and I was happier than I’d been since . . . fucking forever.

* * *

I had never been more pissed off having dealt with other people in a very long time.

I had just come back from the grocery store, arms full of bags -- our standard white bread, granola bars, water, peanut butter, and chocolate -- with the deepest frown I’d had on my face since high school. Everything that could’ve gone wrong at the store, had gone wrong. The store was all out of Tweek’s favorite brand of chocolate, they had somehow sold out of smooth peanut butter and we were stuck with crunchy, and I had to wait for -- I’m not exaggerating -- ten minutes for this fat couple to decide what flavor granola bar they wanted. It was like something straight out of a comedy movie, where you just had to laugh because the characters were so absurd and over the top, but nope. I experienced it fucking _first hand_. And then, once I finally had everything in my basket, my cashier was a condescending douche bag that bagged everything wrong, and then the bag broke as I was walking out of the store, and some puny little middle schoolers laughed at me. I had to go back inside just to re-bag everything, and, if I cared, I would’ve found it totally humiliating.

I just wanted to go back to my room, cram some granola bars into my mouth, and binge Red Racer with Tweek.

I jammed my key into the lock, turning it harder than was probably necessary, (actually, it was so hard that I’m surprised the key didn’t break), and swung the door open. I expected Tweek to be sitting on his bed, or pacing, or doing weird shit like he was always doing, but the room was . . . empty.

“Tweek?” I said.  “Are you in here?” Not in the mood to deal with a panicked Tweek, I dropped to my knees and checked under his bed, but he wasn’t there.

It was weird. Tweek was always in our room, unless he had a class to go to, or he was severely malnourished and needed to make a grocery run. But I had literally _just_ come from the grocery store. And it was a Sunday, so I knew Tweek didn’t have a class. I would’ve walked him if he did. Our schedules were virtually the same, anyway, except for Tuesdays, in which I had Environmental Science, and Tweek had the day off. So that meant one thing.

He had been kidnapped.

Well, that, or he found some other reason to leave our room, but, knowing Tweek, not much could drag him from our room without logical, probable cause.

I’d decided not to worry. I hadn’t found a reason yet to worry, and I wasn’t one for panicking needlessly, so I distracted myself by lifting the lid of my laptop. I was about to type in my password when I heard a key shove itself into the lock from the outside, twist frantically, and then the door burst open, revealing a panting, red-faced Tweek. I raised an eyebrow, about to ask what the hell was going on when he caught my eye.

He immediately shouted, “GAH! NGH! I’m sorry, Craig!”

I looked at him blankly. “For what?”

“It wasn’t my fault! Well . . . okay, maybe it was . . . but I didn’t mean to, it was an accident!”

“Tweek, dude, what did you do?” I knew I came off as irritated and impatient, but really, I hated it when people beat around the bush. I liked things to be simple and explanatory, and I didn’t even know what I was supposed to be mad about.          

Something fell from Tweek’s hand when he screeched and reached up to twist his fingers in his hair. I looked at the floor to see what it was and saw a . . . Walmart bag? 

“Tweek, did you go to Walmart?” I asked, glancing back up at him to see him still on the verge of an absolute breakdown. It was a bit of a completely stupid question, I know, but one I found valid, considering his views on being around other people. He stiffly nodded, his entire body trembling. “Why?”

“GAH! That’s what I was trying to tell you!” he insisted loudly. “I was looking -- and I was _just looking_ \-- at one of your Red Racer DVDs, and I was just thinking about modern technology, which sounds weird, I know, but that’s what I was doing, I _swear_ \-- and I guess I . . . twitched or something, because it fell to the floor, and it scratched!”

When I first heard that I wasn’t feeling particularly _angry_. Kinda indifferent, maybe a little disappointed that my prized possession had been scratched, but I knew it wasn’t the end of the world. I was about to tell him so, when he blurted out,

“So I went to Walmart and bought you a brand new Complete Red Racer TV box set.”

My eyes flew wide open. _He bought me . . . what?!_ Did he know going out how expensive that was gonna be?!  I mean, it was Walmart, but still! Red Racer was one of the longest-lasting children television shows ever, running from 1992 to 2006, with a total of fifteen seasons, 287 episodes, and over 150 hours of content; it didn’t matter if you got it at a fucking garage sail, that shit’s gonna cost you!  

“Tweek, dude . . . how much did you spend?”

Tweek was so fucking jittery . . . “$200 -”

“You just dropped $200 on something like that?” I asked incredulously. “I wouldn’t have been mad at you, it’s just a scratch! I would’ve managed!”

“GAH! NGH! I didn’t want you to hate me!” he exclaimed desperately, his hands fucking _buried_ in his hair. “If you were mad at me, then you wouldn’t ever talk to me again, or if you did, you’d just yell, and you’d never let me watch Red Racer with you, and you’d never be around here, because you wouldn’t want to ever _see_ me again, and what if you got kidnapped, or murdered because you spent so much time outside! GAH! NGH! EHH! _I don’t want you to die!_ You’re my best friend, and I wouldn’t be able to live with myself! How would I ever graduate and live a normal life if your blood was on _my_ hands! The police would find out, and oh God, oh _Jesus_ , I’d be sent to jail for being an accomplice to your murder! I’d be given the _chair_!”

He started fucking hyperventilating. Legitimately. Like, he needed to breath into a paper bag just to get his air back. I stood up, and crossed the room as fast as my long legs would take me, and clapped two hands on either one of his shoulders. “Tweek, calm down,” I said quietly, in that low voice that I knew worked on him every time he got even remotely like that. It worked -- kinda -- but he was too far gone in his panic to fully go back to his normal twitchy self. I sighed. “I promise you that that will never happen. I wouldn’t have hated you for something so . . . simple as a scratch on a DVD. I mean, I’ve had the box set since I was fifteen. I’m surprised _I_ haven’t fucked it up yet. It was bound to get scratched at some point, and it doesn’t matter that _you_ were the one to do it. Now, if I’m mad at you at all, it’s because you just wasted $200 on me.”

“GAH! NGH! But --”

“No buts,” I said firmly. “I know you don’t like going outside, but I am going to _force_ you to return that. I’ll even go with you. You’re a college student. You can’t afford to be buying stuff like that, especially if it’s virtually useless.” I squeezed his shoulders tightly, trying to keep his vibrating torso still. “I’m not mad at you. I promise. I don’t hate you, I won’t never talk to you again, I won’t start avoiding you, I won’t yell at you, and I won’t get murdered. I’m going to keep hanging out with you, watching Red Racer and talking about dumb shit, just like I always do.” I smiled at him.

Tweek squeezed his eyes shut, visibly trying to control his breathing. His entire face was marred with worry, creases lining his eyes and his nose scrunched up in his clear attempts to calm himself down.

We stood like that, Tweek practically in my arms, and me just looking at him, for a few seconds, before he let out a final, extremely deep breath that lasted at least seven seconds and his eyes flickered open. I smiled at him again, and his lips twitched back at me.

I let go of him, taking a step back, and said, smirking at him, “So. We’re best friends now?”

It took a second for what I said to make sense to him, but when it did, his eyes widened and his hands flew up to his hair again. I didn’t mean to send him into a renewed state of panic, so I decided to kill his anxiety before it got the better of him, by taking his hands in mine, pulling them away from his blonde locks, and added, “That’s cool.”

With pink cheeks, Tweek beamed happily at me. It was a smile so sincere, and so purely happy, that only a man with a black heart wouldn’t smile back.

It was the faggiest moment of my life, and that fact didn’t resonate with me until I felt Tweek squeeze my hands. I immediately pulled away, taking a few hasty steps away from him and rubbing the back of my neck. My cheeks were hot, and I was internally beating myself up for being such a pussy bitch.

“So, uh . . .” I said awkwardly, looking anywhere but my roommate. “You, um . . . wanna go return that now? The sooner the better, I guess.”

“Okay,” Tweek agreed, and I could fucking hear the smile in his voice. What a little cheeky asshole.

So that was how I’d come to be walking with Tweek down the sidewalk, eyes cast forward and movements stiff. I was still feeling a little awkward, thanks to our awkward, hand-holding moment that we had back at our dorm room. I had never fallen into such a weird trance-like state due to fucking anybody before, and I was unnerved and uncomfortable that I had let myself get so distracted by something as simple as some other guy’s smile.

The Walmart loomed closer and closer, and the full parking lot did not bode well for Tweek and I. As the doors automatically opened for us, I glanced around at my surroundings. It’d been awhile since I’d been in a place that jam-packed with people. Sure, my classes were too big, as far as I was concerned, and they seemed even bigger because the people were extra obnoxious, but that day at Walmart was like what you’d expect out of a Walmart: screaming children, slow-walking old people, obese men and women riding around in those fat-people go-carts, and groups of other college students shoving each other in the beer and junk-food aisles. It had only been a minute or so, and I already wanted to punch everybody that cut me off in the face.

Almost immediately, I saw Clyde and Token, the former heaving an armful of chips, cookies, and root beer. I remember Token telling me earlier that week that he never let Clyde use a cart whenever they went to a store that sold food, because then he’d waste all his money on artery-clogging and diabetes-inducing shit. If Clyde wanted it, Clyde would have find a way to carry it all. It was a good rule, and probably the only reason that Clyde didn’t look exactly like Cartman. (Well, that, and Clyde actually played almost every sport offered by the South Park schools, instead of just showing up at the practices.)

I did not want to talk to him, because I had just had a totally gay moment with my newly-founded best friend, and I just wanted to escape the public eye and sink into myself, desperately trying to ignore what the fuck happened. And I knew Clyde would invite me somewhere, and he’d give me those fucking puppy dog eyes that made it really fucking hard to say ‘no’ to him, (even though I inevitably would, because Tweek was with me, and, as hard a time as _I_ had just had, Tweek was even more stressed, because he’s _Tweek_ , and Tweek was always about ten times more panicked than everybody at any given time). And that asshole would probably just call Tweek ‘Twitch’ just to see Tweek panic, and I didn’t want to have to calm Tweek down again. Especially because that last time I’d calmed him down that day, we pretty much ended up holding hands like a couple of RuPaul fags.

The good thing about Walmart is that all the registers are near the front door, like most other stores. The _bad_ thing about Walmart is that you always see someone you know there, even if you’re not even in your hometown. Knowing this, and understanding this, I grabbed Tweek by the elbow, and tugged him away from where Clyde could see us, and we just barely made it down the center aisle into the little girls’ clothes before I heard a loud crashing noise, and a very-Clyde-like voice shout disappointed and frustrated obscenities.

Tweek “GAH!”’d, but allowed me to pull him away without question.

Once we were officially safe, enough to talk normally at least, I turned to Tweek and said simply, “Clyde.”

He nodded shakily in understanding. “GAH! NGH! Okay . . .”

“We’ve just gotta avoid seeing anybody we know,” I said, looking over his shoulder and ignoring the fact that I was still holding his elbow. “Because, with your luck, everybody you’ve ever met will be at this specific Walmart today.”

“GAH! NGH! EHH!” Tweek’s eyes widened, and flicked to all his surroundings.

I huffed, mentally cursing myself. I hadn’t actually meant for him to freak out so much, I was just stating that Tweek had terrible luck, and that, to just stay on the safe side, we should’ve been cautious of what aisle we went down in order to make it back to the front. “Don’t worry,” I said quietly. “It shouldn’t be too hard; I’m good at avoiding people.”

There was something about that moment that brought me back to my South Park days, where weird-as-all-fuck adventures were an almost boring daily occurrence. I shook off that feeling -- the tightness in my chest that I’d been occasionally feeling the more I spent time around the asshole South Park crew -- and guided Tweek away from the front and further into the fucking madness.

Tweek and I zig-zagged around the store, circling around the perimeter, and looping back to the front, hoping against hope that Clyde and Token would’ve left.

In the makeup aisle, I saw that bitch that made fun of Tweek, perusing through the various kinds of desperate ways to make her ugly face not as ugly anymore. It’s almost as if she sensed me looking at her, because she straightened up and immediately zoned in on Tweek and I. Her face turned pink, and, for just a second, we stared at each other, but then I glared at her, and she glared back, and Tweek and I moved on.

A couple aisles over, I saw Cartman and Kyle in the health-stuff section, (whatever the fuck that aisle is called), and Kyle looked fucking _pissed_. I mean, he was pretty much always pissed, but he looked _especially_ pissed. His arms were folded over his chest, his face all red, and he was glaring daggers at Cartman, who was smirking smugly and waving a box of condoms in the air under Kyle’s nose. Kyle slapped the box, which flew out of Cartman’s hand and clattered to the floor, effectively wiping the shit-eating grin off of that fat asshole’s face. They both glared at each other, and started arguing loudly. I caught a few words, (like, ‘fuck you’, ‘fatass,’ ‘goddamn Jew’, and ‘can’t even believe we’re fucking dating’,) but I decided that I had seen enough of their drama bullshit, and kept moving.

Bebe and Wendy were in the dairy aisle, perusing different flavors of ice cream. Bebe was rubbing Wendy’s back, and Wendy had her head down, her cheeks blotchy and her eyes red and puffy. I rolled my eyes. Wendy needed to get the fuck over that break up, because chances were, the next day Stan would be pounding on her dorm room door and they’d fuck and get back together. I didn’t spare them a second glance.

In the beer aisle, there were these four guys, loudly arguing about what brand they would get. I scrunched my nose at them, immediately sensing that they were total dicks. I wasn’t particularly affected by their existence, but Tweek clammed up and “GAH!”’d especially loudly, and when I glanced at him, he was staring down that same aisle as me. I narrowed my eyes at the tanned, salmon-shorts-wearing assholes, making a mental note to keep an eye out for them, and make sure they didn’t come near Tweek. He was clearly especially afraid of them.

We finally made it to the front of store, having successfully avoided everybody we passed, but as we walked down that main aisle, trying to find an empty line, we saw _him_.

Kenny was standing behind the register. Fucking _Kenny_ fucking _McCormick_. Fuck my fucking life, because the smirk he sent in our direction was enough to make me bare my teeth. Ever since he acted like a cheeky bastard when the entire South Park crew met Tweek, I’d gotten especially angry whenever I saw him. I was about to steer Tweek away from Kenny’s line, but he had clearly already seen us, and was waving us over to him. I’m not, nor was I ever, one for being polite just because a situation calls for it, but Kenny’s line was the only line that had nobody in it, and, as much as I didn’t want to have any interaction with that asshole at all, my desire to not be in Walmart was much greater, so, with gritted teeth, I led Tweek over to him.

“Well, hello, you two,” Kenny said, folding his arms over his chest and leaning against the counter thing where the drawers full of shit were. “What brings you here?”

Tweek “GAH!”’d, and I quickly realized that Walmart was too full of people for Tweek to be able to properly respond, (judging by how his eyes kept flicking all over the place and wouldn’t settle on a single spot), so I answered for him. “We’re returning something.”

With a raised eyebrow, Kenny asked, “Both of you?”

I narrowed my eyes. “Well, he bought it, but I’m just . . . with him.”

He hummed, taking the bag from Tweek’s hands. “You seem to be with him a lot.”

I felt a growl at the back of my throat, but I held back. For Tweek’s sake. He was terrified of angry people, and seeing his best friend angry would probably be his worst nightmare, next to being kidnapped and raped by a stranger. Or being alone in a room with Cartman. “He’s my roommate, of course I’m with him a lot,” I said stiffly.

“I understand that,” he said, keeping his eyes on the disk set, and checking the receipt that was in the plastic bag. “But you aren’t in your dorm room at the moment. So. why are you with him now, if he’s just your roommate?”

“Well, he’s also my friend,” I said, folding my arms over my chest and glaring at him. I pointedly avoided Tweek’s general direction. “You already knew that.”

Kenny scanned the receipt, and pushed a few buttons on the screen in front of him. “A friend that’s literally always with you?”

“Well . . . okay, so he’s a . . . a _good_ friend --”

“Clyde was a good friend back in South Park, but you weren’t with him nearly as often as you are with Tweek --”

“Okay, so Tweek’s my _best_ friend, what the hell do you want from me?” I demanded angrily, my hands balling into fists by my sides.

I’m pretty sure even Tweek the Oblivious didn’t miss the small smirk on Kenny’s face. “ _Clyde_ was your best friend --”

“Yes, can we just get along with it, please?” I interrupted firmly.

Kenny bit his lip, obviously trying to stifle laughter. I gritted my teeth and pretended I didn’t notice. “Okay, so, what’s your reason for returning this hella expensive box set?”

“The one I already had, Tweek --”

Kenny held a hand up to interrupt me and said, in an obnoxiously mothering voice, “Ah-ah-ah. I was asking _Tweek_. What happened, I thought you two loved Red Racer?”

“GAH! NGH! EHH! We do! But I _broke_ disk nine, and it’s all scratched and it’ll never work again, and I thought Craig would hate me forever if he figured out I ruined his most prized possession, and oh God, oh _Jesus_ , I thought he’d never _talk_ to me again --”

I cleared my throat, patting his absently on the shoulder. I pretended like I didn’t notice the cheeky smirk on Kenny’s face when he looked up from what he was doing. “I already told you, that wouldn’t happen. Just skip that part.” I released him and turned back to our asshole cashier. “We’re returning this, and, as a side note, I don’t wanna be stuck in this hell hole for the rest of my life. I have a history paper to write, and I will kick your ass if you make this way more complicated than it needs to be.”

I wasn’t lying about the history paper existing, but I was lying about the fact that I had to write it. It hadn’t even been officially assigned yet, (just briefly mentioned in class and listed on the class syllabus), and Tweek knew that. He had let me complain about it for a solid five minutes the Monday before that. It was a pick-your-own subject paper, and I hated the fuck out of those. How was I supposed to know what the fuck the teacher was looking for, if I was given no guidelines, aside from it had to be ten pages excluding the cover page and the complete and accurate bibliography? Props to Tweek for sitting through _that_ rant.

Kenny chuckled, holding his arms up in surrender. “Alright, alright. Fine. I’ll let you get back to your _precious_ history paper.” His gaze moved to Tweek, who was standing beside me, (a little too close for my taste, but he was trembling, his eyes flitting at every little noise, so I let it pass), and that stupid fucking smirk never left his face. “Do you have the debit card you paid with?”

Instead of saying yes with words, Tweek just “GAH!”’d, and nodded, reaching into his pocket, pulling out his wallet, and handing over a card.

Kenny finally shut the fuck up, and pushed a few more buttons on the screen, and, while he was distracted, I turned to Tweek, who was still looking all over the place with his big, hazel eyes. I’d never really been in that much public with him before, (meaning Tweek and I actively avoided overly-crowded places, and Walmart was probably the most crowded place in the entire city), so I never really knew the extent of his social anxiety, but it was apparently really bad. I just looked at him for a second, before asking, “You okay, Tweek?”

“GAH!” Tweek squealed, turning his gaze to me. “Yeah!”

I raised an eyebrow. “You sure?”

Tweek shook his head wildly. “No!”

I sighed, knocking my shoulder into his as a way to try to calm him down without having to actually touch him. I’d had fucking _enough_ of that for one day. “It won’t be much longer before we’re finally fucking out of here. Don’t worry.”

Kenny cleared his throat, and that ever-present smirk was on his face. “Isn’t that sweet, you two.”

Tweek “GAH!”’d, and I glared at him, but didn’t say anything.

Kenny chuckled, before handing over a printed receipt and Tweek’s card back to Tweek. “You’re all set, Tweek. $214.88 is back on your card. And let his be a lesson to you to be more careful with expensive shit.” Kenny paused, before adding casually, “You know, maybe this whole situation is a sign.”

“GAH! A sign of what?” Tweek gasped, taking the piece of paper in shaking hands and staring with wide eyes at the asshole behind the counter.

“A sign that you two need to start doing something other than watching Red Racer all the time,” he answered, a stupid smirk on his face.

I rolled my eyes, grabbing Tweek by the wrist and tugging him away from Kenny and all his bad influence. “Yeah, yeah, thanks for your input, asshat. I’ll see you later.”

Kenny laughed. “‘Bye guys.”

As Tweek and I left through the automatic front doors of Walmart, (ignoring the bored, suicidal-looking greeter, who halfheartedly called after us to have a nice day), I thought back to what Kenny said. It brought me back to that day where Tweek and I actually forgot we were watching Red Racer, and got distracted by talking to each other. It was the weirdest fucking thing ever, because I’ve never been one to turn down Red Racer in favor of fucking _talking_ to someone. It was completely unlike me, and that pissed me off more than anything else that had transpired that day.

“GAH! Jesus Christ, that was so much pressure!” Tweek muttered under his breath. Although, Tweek muttering was pretty much like normal talking, so I heard him loud and clear.

“Well . . .” I said slowly, trying to think of something to make him feel better. While I had gotten better at making him relax, I was still at a loss sometimes, without repeating the same thing over and over again. “You’re fine, though, right?” I rolled my eyes at myself. Like that was going to calm him down.

“I guess so,” Tweek stuttered. “I just . . . hate Walmart, so much.”

“I think everyone does,” I said, thinking back to the Walmart incident back in South Park, when everybody decided to boycott the place, but ending up going there anyway.

“GAH! When we get back to our dorm room, you wanna play Go Fish?”

I turned surprised eyes to Tweek, silently asking him if he really just asked me that, but he was facing forward, looking as if he hadn’t actually said anything weird at all. My mouth opened to say something, I thought briefly about what I was going to say, and, when I realized that squat came to mind, I closed it again, averting my eyes. Playing Go Fish on a Sunday afternoon was the most childish thing I could even think of, but habitually watching Red Racer wasn’t much better, so I immediately dispelled the thought that I was somehow _above_ playing a made-for-children card game.

Part of me was tempted to decline, but a bigger part of me -- that actually really enjoyed talking and hanging out with Tweek without both our eyes being glued to a TV screen -- won.

I glanced at him again, nodded, (even though I knew he wasn’t looking at me), and said blankly, “Okay.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Sounds of Saturn is a real thing, so here's a link to the NASA website in case you want to learn more about it. It's really super cool! (Just copy and paste)
> 
> https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/multimedia/pia07966.html


	9. Of Being Fifteen Minutes Late

Getting another best friend four years after losing a best friend is a . . . weird feeling, in that everything’s totally fucking different. Because, yeah, Tweek was my best friend, and Clyde was my best friend before him, but they were both completely different. Clyde . . . was an asshole. And I know I say all the time that I can’t fucking remember why I was best friends with his sorry ass, but I actually do.

Clyde was the first kid I met at preschool. (And, no, this story isn’t as exciting as I’m sure you think it is.) We both tried to hang our coats on the same hook, so I flipped him off. He got this confused look on his face, and tried to flip me off back, but he ended up lifting the wrong finger. And then I laughed at him, and I guess he didn’t really understand that I was making fun of him, because he started laughing, too. I told him my name, he told me his, and then we started playing with blocks together.

And that’s about the only memory I have of preschool. After that, I was just always around Clyde. Him and I did everything together, like Tweek and I. But I didn’t really see him the same way I saw Tweek. Clyde was just this permanent fixture in my life back at South Park. I’m not even fucking joking with you when I say that him and I had sleepovers almost every weekend, and there was even a time in fifth grade where I just stayed with him at his house for an entire week. It was the week of that day that marked one year since his mother had died, and he was all quiet, and didn’t eat much, and wouldn’t text any of us back when Token, Jimmy, and I tried to talk to him, so I just showed up at his house with a shit ton of tacos from Taco Bell. He blubbered all over me when I gave them to him, and he got tears and snot and shit all over my jacket. I patted him awkwardly on the back and just let him cry for a while. It was probably one of the most uncomfortable afternoons of my life, but he pulled himself together after like half an hour, and asked me to spend the night and play video games with him. So I did. And then I just . . . didn’t leave. My Mom was so pissed off.

But with Tweek, it’s . . . different. As much time as I spent around Clyde, I always reached this point where I just needed to be away from him. It was when I wanted some alone time with Stripe, or when Red Racer was on, (Clyde refused to watch it with me, even though he was the most childish child in all of South Park), or when I plain just didn’t want to be around him. Clyde cried _all the fucking time_. Over almost every inconvenience, you could count on Clyde to be the first one to burst into tears. That was one of my least favorite things about him. I couldn’t, and can’t, handle crying people.

But with Tweek, I never really felt that pull to be away from him. Because as noisy as Tweek was on a constant basis, he always knew when it was time to stop talking. After we shut off Red Racer in favor of actually studying, he would retire to his side of the room, I would retire to mine, and we’d work. Sure, maybe we’d share offhanded comments about something or other, but for the most part, we just did our own thing. And then when we were finished, we’d come back together and hang out again. If I was roommates with Clyde, I would _never_ have a moment of peace. He would always be talking, even if I had work to do. Even if _he_ had work to do. He doesn’t understand that line like Tweek does.

And another thing. If Clyde asked me to walk him to classes because he was afraid of the other guys, I would’ve laughed at him and told him not to be a pussy. If I _ever_ told something like that to Tweek, I would’ve been so fucking pissed off at myself, because it would probably ruin a lot of the friendship we had.

And I didn’t actually want that to happen.

Which was why I was . . . actually a little nervous to tell Tweek that my asshole history professor, _Dr_. Mullins, (don’t you fucking _dare_ forget the _Dr_.), gave me a bullshit grade, and I needed to be firm, and strict with _Dr_. Mullins, and tell him that he made a dumbass decision. But I really couldn’t tolerate that B- he gave me. I deserved way more than that, and I wouldn’t stand for the unfairness.

I procrastinated telling Tweek about it. I wasn’t _scared_ or anything, but I didn’t really enjoy watching him freak out. I mean, sometimes it was funny, but mostly it was just sad and it made me feel bad. So, when I woke him up that morning, I made it out that everything was going as usual. Nothing out of the ordinary for Mornings with Craig and Tweek. I woke him up at our normal time, I made fun of how he mumbled threats for me to go away, and he drank enough coffee to make a normal person suffer lethal heart palpitations, if that even was a thing.

It wasn’t until I was walking him to his class, and his building loomed in sight, that I said something. “Tweek, I’m going to be about fifteen minutes late picking you up today.”

“GAH! Why?” Tweek asked, his voice only slightly higher pitched than what I would consider normal for him.

“I’ve gotta stay back and talk with my teacher about this grade I got on my last test,” I said, adjusting my bookbag on my shoulder. “It was total bullshit, I definitely did better than a B-. I don’t actually know how long it’s gonna take. It might not even take five minutes, but I can promise you, it won’t last more than fifteen. I’ll just walk out if my teacher starts going on and on about irrelevant shit.”

Tweek let out a shaky breath, but nodded. “Okay,” he agreed. “I’ll just be . . . waiting out front.”

I nodded in agreement, but didn’t say anything.

When we reached the front door to the brick building, we waved to each other, (or, rather, he lifted a hand, and then I lifted a hand), and I left.

* * *

So, lucky for me, my professor wasn’t a total asshole, and bumped my grade up to a B+ when I told him that I had actually answered a few of the questions he marked wrong actually  _right_ , and he’d just misgraded it. And he actually _let it go_ after that. But my relief was short-lived; he proceeded to ramble on and on and fucking _on_ about how this one time, he had a professor that _blah blah blah_ , and then _blah blah blah_ happened, and fucking _blah blah_ fucking _blah_. . .

I’m surprised I didn’t blow my brains out just listening to him. I stayed true to my word, though, I managed to escape after fifteen minutes or his droning on about something that didn’t even involve me.

As the door to my building closed, I glanced at my watch, but didn’t hurry up at all. I really hated running, or rushing, or walking more than two miles an hour, and I ultimately decided that tending to Tweek’s paranoia wasn’t worth busting a lung. And he seemed to be just fine in the time I’d been walking him to/from classes, so I figured he’d be okay if I was late just once.

When I finally arrived to the building of Tweek’s class, I realized something both strange and also a little concerning.

Tweek wasn’t there.

Every single time I’d ever picked Tweek up, he was standing beside the doorway, leaning against the brick building, trying not to make too many twitchy noises on the off-chance someone was watching him. But he wasn’t there. And Tweek wouldn’t have skipped out on me. He was too scared of humans in general to wander off on his own. _And_ he told me he’d be waiting for me.

Yeah, something just . . . didn’t feel quite right to me.

But there really wasn’t much I could do. He wasn’t there, so he wasn’t there. That’s all there was to it. And it wasn’t possible for him to still be talking to his professor, even if he was held behind. I was fifteen minutes late. And I don’t think Tweek would allow his professor to hold him back, because he knew I would be there to pick him up. Eventually. He’d be too afraid of making me angry, even though I knew professors could sometimes be self-righteous assholes, and I would’ve understood, having gone through it before, myself.

So I hesitated a moment, before shrugging and starting to leave. Maybe I’d find him on the walk back, I reasoned, turning away from the building.

But I was stopped in my tracks when I heard a muffled grunt and some distant laughter. I was instantly intrigued.

Sure, it could’ve been a couple getting it on, hot and heavy and kinky in the alleyway in between the two science buildings, but I was too curious to just walk away.

I know. Craig Tucker being curious. But the noises could've also been a fight, (I’d been in enough of those to know what they sounded like), and a fight was either a really good thing, or a really bad thing, depending on who was involved. Either way, I was risking it.

Because Tweek was missing, and I had a bad feeling in my gut.

When I rounded the corner to the alley, my heart dropped into my stomach.

Four guys were standing over Tweek. Fucking _Tweek_. Probably the most helpless human being on the planet, and they were taking turns kicking him in the stomach and uttering taunting insults whenever he grunted in pain.

I was frozen in place, too horrified to move. Never in the whole time I’d known Tweek had I thought I’d ever see him being mercilessly beaten. Never in my entire life did I think watching some kid get beaten would affect me as much as it was in that moment.

Tweek’s face was twisted in pain, fear, and an odd longing, that suggested he was hoping someone -- anyone -- would happen upon the scene and save him. It was a good thing I had such good hearing and had a sudden curiosity to explore some weird noises in an alley, or else there really _wouldn’t_ be anyone to help him. And, if I did just leave without inspecting said weird noises, I would’ve gone out of my mind with worry, due to the fact that he never would’ve shown up at our dorm room, and only God knows how pissed off I would’ve been at whoever hurt him if Tweek ever did manage to stumble back to our room, with broken bones, a split lip, a black eye . . .

But I couldn’t move. I really fucking couldn’t move. I don’t know what came over me, but the scene was just so horrific that my body refused to make a move to help him, or abandon him. (Like I would’ve fucking abandoned him, though.) I just fucking _watched_. Tweek would try to cover his face, but one of the guys would pull his arms away, leaving him wide open for attack. His face was pink, but there was a pronounced red mark on one of his cheekbones, and I just fucking _knew_ that he’d been punched, and that that red mark would turn into a nasty, purple, swollen bruise. His big, hazel eyes were wet, but he wasn’t audibly crying, and his blonde hair, which was already pretty hectic, was sticking particularly straight up, as if it were a visual representation of his fear. After every kick, he would keel further and further into himself, like a toddler, but he never once pleaded with them to stop.

One of the jacked, probably-had-a-longer-police-record-than-I-did-but-got-away-with-it-because-he-was-a-charming-little-shit guys crouched down next to Tweek’s face, grabbing Tweek’s jaw tightly in his meaty fingers, and said in a quiet, acidic voice, “Now, say, ‘I’m a faggot.’”

Tweek whimpered, squeezing his eyes shut and trying to wrench his head free. He didn’t say anything, instead biting his lip to prevent more noises from escaping him.

The guy -- I couldn’t see his face, and not even his profile -- growled audibly and rose to his feet, swinging a foot back and swiftly kicking Tweek in the gut again. Tweek let out a loud, choked, “ _OOF_!” sound, and he twisted his head so that his face was pressed in the grass, and his eyes squeezed shut.

“I _said_ , say ‘I’m a faggot,’ and maybe I won’t bash your dick-loving face in!”

“GAH! NGH! EHH!” Tweek’s normal noises of distress were amplified by a million, while also slightly wheezy due to having been kicked in the stomach so often, and it was a miracle he even managed to say, his voice broken and desperate, “I . . . I’m a . . . faggot . . .”

That was the last straw. I couldn’t take it anymore. Whatever had seized my muscles, freezing them in place, had let up, and I rushed forward, landing a punch in the face of the nearest asshole as hard as I could. He fell to the ground with a very satisfying grunt, and, after a beat of stillness, all his friends glared at me in slight confusion and mounting anger. Tweek barely acknowledged my presence, or if he did, then I didn’t notice, because I didn’t have eyes for him, not just yet. I was too focused on scaring away the little shits who decided it was a good idea to beat up one of the smallest, most helpless people on campus.

I growled at the four of them and said in a low voice, “Don’t touch him.”

“Hey,” one of the dickholes said, as if some great epiphany had been bestowed upon him. “You’re that guy that always walks Tweek the Freak to all of his classes.”

The guy I socked in the face stumbled to his feet, and, once he regained his balance, he lifted his gaze to me. And after a few seconds of just fucking staring at me, he smirked, and his eyes glistened with amusement. “Jesus Christ, Mitch, you’re right.” He snorted, rubbing a hand absentmindedly on his cheek. “Don’t tell me you’re a fag, too.”

I balled my hands into fists at my sides and felt an intense, burning anger grow red hot in my stomach. My heart was pounding. I was breathing so hard, I was hardly breathing. “I’m not a fag,” I said finally. “And he’s not, either. And if you don’t fucking leave him alone, I’m going to bash _your_ face in for being a complete homophobic jackass with a tiny dick.” I spat on the ground by his feet and snarled, “Now leave before I send you to the ICU with a gift basket that says, ‘Fuck You.’”

The guys all exchanged amused glances.

“ _You’re_ going to fight _us_?” the so-called leader of the group said.

“That’s right,” I answered harshly.

“And . . . you’re under the impression that you’re going to _win_?” another of the assholes said.

“I _am_ going to win,” I answered, my hands so tightly balled, my nails were near drawing blood. “Do one more thing to piss me off, and I’ll break every bone in your body with my bare hands.”

“One more thing?” the leader said, his voice all patronizing, and just the sound of it made me bare my teeth. “Like . . . touching your little faggy lover boy?”

“Touch him again and I’ll fucking _murder_ you,” I spat, my entire body shaking in my anger and my sudden burst of adrenaline.

“Touch him . . . like this?”

The leader crouched down quickly, to where Tweek was still curled into a ball, trying to ignore everything going on around him. Asshat’s hand barged through Tweek’s arm-made barrier, and gripped his hair tightly, lifting him up harshly until Tweek was in this weird half-sitting, half-sprawled-on-the-ground position. He squealed, his hands flying up to asshat’s fists to try to dislodge them from his blonde locks, but that obvious didn’t work. 

I only saw that whole scene for a few seconds, (which, honestly, was too much time in my book), before I delivered the most rage-filled kick to the face in all my life. The guy instantly released Tweek, falling onto his back, knocked completely the fuck out. All of his little goons started in after that, but I was too royally pissed to not be prepared for them. Even though my thoughts were screaming, my head was surprisingly clear, allowing me to beat the living shit out of them, one-by-one.

The fight was all very intricate and badass. I demolished them.

In the end, they were all lying unconscious on the ground, bodies splayed in varying positions, with varying degrees of injuries, and the knuckles on my right hand were throbbing painfully, (I noted distantly that they were probably broken, or at least pre-badly bruised), but I was too concerned with the battered Tweek to really notice. As I was still catching my breath, I dropped to my knees beside him, and took his face in my hands, feeling part of me break when he flinched at my touch. He hardly ever did that before that fight.

“Tweek?” I asked quietly. “Are you okay?”

“NGH! EHH! AHH!” he screeched, finally relaxing some in my grasp. He stared up at me with his big hazel, almost vibrating eyes, and I stared back just as intently. “No! Everything hurts!”

Yep, there went another part of my heart, breaking in two solid chunks. “Do you need to go to the hospital?”

“ _No_!” he exclaimed loudly. “I just . . . I need coffee!”

I decided to disregard his plea for caffeine, and instead asked, “Is anything broken?”

“GAH! No!” he said, shaking his head wildly. “Just . . . GAH! -- they kicked me a lot . . . I’m just . . . a little bruised, that’s all --”

I sighed roughly. “Don’t say ‘that’s all’, Tweek, they just kicked the shit out of you!”

Tweek didn’t answer more than a few anxious noises, and he averted his eyes.

I closed my eyes in response to his avoidance, willing my breathing to get under control. It was so fucking frustrating caring about someone that much.

When I figured I could talk without shouting, I opened my eyes again, and said, “If you’re sure nothing’s broken, and that you don’t have a concussion, I’ll take you back to our room, and I’ll make you some coffee, and we can binge Red Racer. But you have to _promise_ me that that’s what you need. If I find out that you have a broken femur or a ruptured spleen or something, I’m going to be fucking _pissed_.”

“GAH! NGH! I promise!” he insisted in a shrill voice, and I decided I was gonna believe him for the time being, but I’d keep an eye on him to make sure he wasn’t lying. He had a habit of doing that when he didn’t want a lot of attention on him, which is an action I understood, but did not appreciate. Because then I couldn’t help him.

I let out a breath, and released his face, straightening up slightly so I could assess how to lift him without hurting him even more. “Okay, um . . . I’m gonna lift you up . . . just, uh . . .” I slipped an arm under his arm, gripping his waist, and heaved him to his feet. He let out little grunts all the way, but I ignored them as best I could, because I knew that getting him back to our room was the most important thing. I could tend to him later, but step one was getting him the fuck out of there.

Tweek and I had only been walking for, like a minute, before I realized that our position, my arm under his armpit and resting on his opposite shoulder, and his arm wrapped around my neck, was noooot very efficient at all. And, adding onto our unfortunate but otherwise hilarious height difference, I was terrified of moving too quickly. I didn’t want to hurt him even more.

I guess Tweek noticed the slow pace I set for the two of us, because he said in a flat, and yet very shaky voice, “GAH! Craig, you can walk faster. I’m not going to -- NGH! --  _break_ , you know.”

I ignored Tweek, because he clearly _couldn’t_ walk faster. He grunted or whimpered with almost every step, and, with his arm so highly elevated, I’m sure he was _very_ uncomfortable. I’m not even fucking joking, I had almost an entire foot on him. If I were _any_ taller, his arm would snap at the shoulder, and then he’d _really_ need to go to the hospital.

“I’m too tall for this,” I mumbled, adjusting my arm so that I wasn’t completely trying to twist his arm out of it’s socket. Before I could stop my dumb fucking mouth, I asked him, _seriously_ asked him, “Can I pick you up?”

“GAH! NGH! _What?!”_ Tweek exclaimed, looking up at me with surprised, frightened eyes. I had a very good idea as to why he got so nervous about my request. I wasn’t completely comfortable with it, myself, but, as far as I was concerned, me holding him was the simplest solution, and I figured we’d just ignore the awkwardness of the whole thing in favor of avoiding further injury.

“If I carry you back to our dorm room,” I explained, “this whole ‘trying to get you back without killing you’ wouldn’t be so . . . uncomfortable.” I looked down at him blankly, making sure my face didn’t betray any of the weird, twisting feelings in my heart and stomach.

“GAH! Well . . . okay . . .” he mumbled under his breath, averting his eyes to the sidewalk.

My brain quickly flitted through all the different ways I could’ve carried him, but only two made sense: bridal style, (which was _not_ fucking happening), and piggy back. I ultimately decided that piggy back was probably the best option, so I released my hold on Tweek, which prompted Tweek to let me go, too, and I dropped to my knees in front of him, my back facing him.

There was a beat of awkward silence, besides Tweek’s little anxious, twitchy noises, where the two of us just sat or stood there, in that position.

“Well?” I asked finally. “Are you going to climb on or not?”

“Oh!” Tweek exclaimed in surprise. He made his little twitchy noises for a few seconds, before I heard a long, deep, shaky sigh, and some shuffling around. And then _finally_ , after I felt like an idiot for way longer than I’d ever felt in my life, I felt him wrap his arms around my neck, and his knees lock onto my waist. I rolled my eyes at the fact that we were actually doing this, and that it was _my_ fucking idea, but I stood up anyway, grabbing onto the backs of his thighs and lifting him so that I could easily walk with him hanging onto me like a fucking man-child.

I prayed the shit out of my soul that I wouldn’t run into anyone that would immediately recognize us, but I guess my good luck, (fucking _what_ good luck), ran out, because about halfway back to our dorm room, we stumbled across my arch nemesis dating all the way back to my South Park days.

Stan Marsh had crossed the street in our direction, and was standing in front of us, arms folded over his chest, and an eyebrow raised in the most condescending way. I growled at the sight of him. Jesus, just looking at him reminded me of _why_ he was my arch nemesis to begin with.

“What the hell are you guys doing?” Stan asked, flatly.

I adjusted my hold on the backs of Tweek’s thighs, and I felt his legs tighten around my waist and his arms wrap more firmly around my neck. I had no idea what his face looked like, but my face was pink, as much as I tried to make the blush _fucking go away_. “What the hell are _you_ doing without your little asshole posse?” I asked, my voice a little more defensive than it probably should’ve been.

Stan still looked suspicious as hell, his narrowed eyes flitting between Tweek and I. “I just came from probability and statistics, and wanted to walk back to my apartment by myself. Why are you carrying Tweek?”

Before I could answer, Tweek “GAH!”’d _right_ in my fucking ear, and I nearly jumped out of my shoes.  Even though I wouldn’t have been able to look directly at him because of our position, I tilted my head so that it was closer to his general direction, and said, “Tweek, what the hell?!”

Tweek mumbled an apology to me, before resting his forehead on my shoulder and nuzzling my coat. I huffed, turning my attention back to Stan, who was fighting off a smirk.

“What the hell is so funny, Marsh?” I asked, scowling at him.

“Nothing, Craig. Just . . .” he shook his head, chuckling quietly. “Nothing.”

“Well, alright then,” I said, my voice still sharp and off-putting. Well, I _say_ off-putting, but literally nobody from South Park was ever afraid of me. It wasn’t until I _left_ South Park that people actually left me the fuck alone. “Tweek and I will just going.”

“Have a good afternoon,” Stan said slyly, smirking at me, his eyes briefly flitting to Tweek.

I had a feeling he was trying to tell me something, I just didn’t care enough to figure out what he was trying to say, so I shrugged and said, “You, too, or whatever.”

Before he could attempt further conversation, I hurried away from him as fast as I could go with 118 pounds of trembling Tweek on my back, and a bookbag that housed both Tweek's textbooks and mine, still draped around my neck and right shoulder. I was _desperate_ to get back to our room without running into anyone else. Specifically Cartman. God _damn_ , I would’ve gone psycho on his ass if I ran into him and he said fucking _anything_ to me or Tweek. I just _wasn’t_ in the mood.

Thankfully, the rest of the walk went asshole-free, but I had to stop at the foot of the stairs. I cursed the fact that Tweek and I lived on the third floor of the building.

“Tweek . . . I don’t think I can carry you all the way up the stairs,” I said to him slowly, and he sighed softly in response. He really seemed to have gotten comfortable on my back, because he nuzzled my coat again, and his arms around my neck flexed. “Can you walk up the stairs by yourself?”

Tweek “GAH!”’d, but I felt him nod jerkily, so I bent down slightly and released his thighs, and his feet dropped lightly to the floor. As soon as I was standing on my own, I stretched my back, (it wasn’t particularly bothersome to have Tweek clinging to me, and he really hadn’t hurt it or anything, but it just seemed like the thing to do), and looked over at him. He was staring at the floor, his arms folded protectively over his stomach, and he worried his bottom lip something fierce.

I sighed at the sight, and came to a decision that I’d already told myself I wouldn’t resort to.

“If you never tell anyone, and forget about it as soon as it’s over, I’ll . . . carry you up the stairs,” I said slowly, and I regretted the words as soon as they left my mouth. I _hated_ how fucking comfortable I was touching him. I kid you not when I say that physical contact between me and everybody else in the world was virtually non existent.

Tweek looked up at my proposition, his eyes wide and his mouth hanging open just a little bit. I could see bite marks on his bottom lip, and it obvious that he had almost drawn blood from how hard he was biting himself, but I pretended I hadn’t seen anything out of the ordinary, and waited for him to speak. “GAH! NGH! But -- but you just --”

I shrugged. “I can’t carry you piggyback -- oh, _fuck_ , I just said piggyback out loud . . .” I groaned, and ran a tired hand down my face. I continued before Tweek could react. “I promise you, I would’ve dropped you if I carried you up like . . . _that_.”

Tweek spluttered for a moment, before saying, “Well then how --”

I swung my bookbag so that it was resting on my back, and walked over close to him. I bent down slightly, grabbed him from behind the knees from one arm, and just under the arms with my other. He squealed, his arms immediately flying around my neck, and, because he twisted his body so suddenly, he winced and let out a groan.

“Like this,” I said blankly, ignoring the heat in my cheeks, and refused to look at him. “Now . . . don’t move, or anything, because you’ll hurt yourself. Like you just did.”

Tweek was . . . eerily quiet after that. His arms were looped around my neck, his head resting on my shoulder, and he hardly even “GAH!”’d as I made my way up three flights of stairs with a still-trembling, five-and-a-half-foot manchild in my arms.

I had to put him down as we arrived at our dorm room, because I had to unlock the door, but, in the short amount of time it took for us to even get to our door, he seemed to have gotten extremely comfortable again. I mean, I wasn’t scrawny or anything, but I was on the skinnier side, so I didn’t think I’d ever be _comfortable_ \-- I’m pretty sure it’s common knowledge that the ‘teddy bear’ types are the ones that are comfortable to rest on, which might be why Kyle resorted to dating the fat tub of lard that was his boyfriend. But apparently Tweek enjoyed . . . being in my arms enough to be hesitant to stand on his own.

I refused to have a reaction to that thought.

Tweek walked into our room first, but I was quickly following after him, a hand out behind him in case he stumbled backwards. He marched straight for his side of the room, but then stopped by his bed, looking at it regretfully, and frowned.

“GAH! NGH! Craig, I don’t think I can make the fort today,” he said in this broken, apologetic voice. “It hurts to move.”

I rolled my eyes, feeling that exasperation for Tweek’s lack of self-preservation rise in me again. “Tweek, you don’t have to worry about that. I didn’t think you were going to.”

Tweek looked up at me, twisting his neck so that he was looking over his shoulder, and his big, hazel eyes were bigger than I’d ever seen them. “Really?”

I nodded, and tried to smile at him, but he was just too . . . pitiful-looking, (and I meant that in as nice a way as possible), to really give off any sincerity. “Really.”

“GAH! Okay,” he said quietly, slowly, and settled himself down on his bed. His head dropped to his pillow, and he snuggled into it with a long, drawn-out sigh.

He looked tired as hell. His eyes were hazy and unfocused, drooping every once in awhile, and being forcibly opened when he realized he was slipping under. He hadn’t even asked me to put on Red Racer, or make him some coffee, (two things I promised I’d do for him), but the more I observed him from my bed, the more firmly I decided to leave him alone. Even though he’d actually been sleeping more than I know he did before we met, he was still a long ways away from having a normal cycle, (though I couldn’t really talk), so I knew that, if he was tired, he should sleep.

The poor guy needed it.

After about five minutes, his eyes fluttered closed, and didn’t open again. His breathing evened out, and his face relaxed into an expression peaceful enough for my concern to lessen. I realized that I had to take action against the assholes that beat Tweek up. Not necessarily to get revenge on them, (I think the asswhooping I delivered was enough to put them off taunting Tweek, and I knew that Tweek would hate to be dragged through some blame game of “He Threw the Punch First”,), but to let the president know that I was the one that put those jock-y assholes in their place, in the form of knocking them straight unconscious.

Somewhere along the line, I’m not exactly sure when, I’d developed a conscience, and it was rearing his ugly head, telling me to own up to my actions. South Park me would flip off the world and just say, “Fuck that,” but Middle Town me, the me that was best friends with Tweek Tweak, knew that something would happen to throw me under the bus, and the repercussions would be even worse if I didn’t go straight to the source of punishment.

But I worried that, if I did leave to talk to the president, Tweek would wake up and find the room empty, so I tore a scrap piece of paper from a spare notebook at the foot of my bed, and wrote the following note on it;

 

_Tweek,_

_Gone to the main office to talk with the president. Eat something. You can touch the Red Racer DVD’s, I don’t mind. Don’t move too much, you’ll hurt yourself. I’ll be back later._

_Craig_

 

I must’ve proofread that five-sentence note for a solid five minutes, before I decided I didn’t really care enough about how he would take it. I left it on his bedside table, where I knew he would see it if he woke up from his sudden power nap. I stood back for a moment, and watched Tweek sleep for longer than I’m pretty sure was normal. I know, that makes me sound like a total creep, but it was rare for him to be so still. I mean, I’d seen him sleep, countless times whenever I woke him up in the morning, but the sight never failed to catch my attention.

Tweek mumbled nonsense in his sleep, and that stirred me from my stupor. I shook my head stupidly, and turned away, grabbing my phone and key from my bookbag, and placed them in my coat pocket.

It took me about twenty minutes to walk to the main offices. It was on the very edge of campus, in a smaller brick building with trees and bushes and shift decorating the lawn surrounding it. I didn’t hesitate to just barge right inside and make my way over to the main desk.

“Hello, I’d like to speak with the president, please?” I asked as politely as I was capable of sounding.

The woman behind the desk spared me a single, half-of-a-second glance, before averting her attention back to her computer in front of her, where she was most likely wasting time playing solitaire. “Do you have an appointment?” she asked, her voice sounding extremely bored.

I shook my head. “No.”

The woman sighed. “Well, he’s not in a meeting right now. If you can make it quick, I’ll let him know there’s a kid here to see him.”

I narrowed my eyes at her. I didn’t appreciate being called ‘kid’, but I ignored what I considered to be an insult, instead listening to her pick up the phone next to her on the desk, push a button, and tell whoever was on the other end that there was a “visitor requesting to see you.” She waited as the president responded to her, and she nodded at whatever he was saying. After a moment, she said, “Alright, I’ll let him know,” and then pressed another button, hanging up the phone with a loud clatter. “You can go right in,” she said to me blankly.

I turned away from her, having no desire to keep talking to her, and muttered a quick, “Thank you,” before hurrying away.

The first thing the president said when I walked into his office, which was nice and warm and smelled like cinnamon, was “Good afternoon.” He sounded so fucking pleasant, too, and I crumpled up my nose at the sight of him. He was wearing a nicely-tailored suit, a purple tie, and he had his short hair free of any oily products, the sort that felt nice at first, but then quickly turned crusty and hard. He stood up, abandoning whatever paperwork was in front of him, and held a hand out for me to shake. I took it after a beat of hesitation, but dropped it almost immediately afterwards.

I wasn’t really in the mood for pleasantries, so I just sat down in the big leather chair that he gestured to, and said, “I don’t know if they’re still gonna be there if you send someone to check, but I just beat up these four guys that are in the morning physics class. They should be in the alley between the two science buildings.”

A thick silence coated the room, and I watched with bored interest as the smile on the president’s face melted away, and he averted his eyes in thought. He seemed to be processing what I’d said, probably not expecting such a blunt, sudden confession. Finally, he looked back at me, and frowned. “Son, why would you beat up four young men? And it was just you?”

I nodded. “It was just me. But it was in . . . sorta self defense.”

The president -- who’s name, according to his name placard on the big, mahogany desk was Dr. William Jacob Matthews -- raised an eyebrow. “Sort of?”

I tilted my head in thought. “Well, they were beating up this other kid in the same physics class, and I just . . . happened to be walking by.” It was the truth, but it sounded like a lie. “I mean, I wasn’t in any danger, but this kid was being beat up, in every sense of the term.”

Matthews removed his glasses from his face, and cleaned them on this little felt pad he pulled from his suit pocket. He looked tired. Not tired in the same sense as Tweek, but tired like he was sick of his job. I wondered if maybe this was a story he’d heard often in his career. After he finished polishing his glasses, he put them back on and said thoughtfully, “Is this young man alright?”

I raised an eyebrow. “The guy that got beat up? Yes, he’s fine. He’ll probably be covered in bruises tomorrow, but there’s nothing broken, and he doesn’t have a concussion. I’ve been boxing since I was thirteen, I know how to check for concussions.” I added that last sentence defensively when Matthews gave me a dubious look. “He’s back in our dorm room, sleeping. I don’t want this to be a big issue, and I’m sure my roommate doesn’t, either, but I just don’t know if those four guys want to do anything about it. Something tells me they won’t. It must be embarrassing for four guys to lose a fight when the odds were in their favor.” I shrugged. “I know that fighting isn’t a good thing, but I think I was justified in my actions.”

Matthews seemed to be taken aback by my explanation. He studied me for a few seconds, long enough to make me squirm under his eye, before he spoke. “Well, since this is your first offense, I’ll let you off with a warning, but I should inform you that fighting is _not_ tolerated at this institution,” he said sternly. It was only after this statement that I respected him. He seemed professional, and not chummy, like I worried he would be when I first met him.

“I understand, Dr. Matthews,” I said, nodding. “It won’t happen again.” I stood up again, and reached a hand out, which he graciously took, and we shook on my apology.

I turned to leave, as I figured our conversation was be over, but Matthews called for me to stop. I turned back around, and tried not to appear impatient. “Yes?”

“Do you know the names of the four gentlemen involved with the altercation?” he asked diplomatically.

I shook my head. “I have no idea. I don’t have physics with them. I never met them in my life, up until this afternoon.”

Matthews didn’t appear to be affected by this. I liked him more and more the more time I spent around him. “Will they require medical attention?”

I shook my head again. I knew for a fact that I didn’t really hurt them enough for them to have to go to the hospital. I just beat them enough to make sure they were unconscious, but none of their bones were fractured, none of them had internal bleeding, and I was confident in saying that there wouldn’t be a concussion in sight. I told Matthews as much, and he nodded in understanding.

“If that’s all, I should get back to my roommate,” I said, taking a step back to illustrate my desire to leave. “I don’t want to leave him alone too long, in case he wakes up and needs me.”

Matthews smiled and gestured to the closed door. “By all means, you’re free to go. Have a nice afternoon.”

I felt like laughing. He didn’t really seem like the sort of president to give a shit about this sort of thing. I lacked the general information needed to pursue the conflict, so he was willing to just let it go. A respectable characteristic if I do say so myself. “Thank you, sir, you, too.”

* * *

When I got back to my dorm room, almost an hour after I’d first left, Tweek was still sleeping. He had rolled over onto his side so that he was facing the wall, his blankets not even on him, but clutched in his iron grasp. When the door closed, (loud enough so that I was worried it might’ve startled him awake), he shifted onto his stomach, with his knees tucked in slightly and his face facing my side of the room. His lips were parted slightly, a dribble of drool escaping the corner of his mouth onto his pillow, and his eyes were shut delicately. After a few seconds of just watching him, I was rewarded with these following words spewing from his unconscious mouth:

“Mmm, Craig . . .”

At first, these words, (that were laced with a moan), sounded more-than platonic, but, just as my face was starting to heat up at the very thought, he added, in a voice less . . . ugh . . . _pleasured_ , and more grateful, “Thank you, Craig . . .” and I relaxed. I really thought for a second that . . .

Naw. What a ridiculous thought. 

I thought he was finished, (as often as Tweek talked in his sleep, it never lasted for very long), but he continued, saying, “No, Green Racer is better than Blue Racer . . . Just a granola bar for me, please . . . Hold the mayonnaise . . .”

I chuckled, rolling my eyes in amusement.

It surprised me to no end at that, at the beginning of the semester, I was so against being his friend, let alone _best_ friend, but, even though my knuckles would still throb if I moved them a certain way, I was sooo happy just looking at him.

It was a family curse, I swear it. When we Tucker’s form attachments, they are almost painfully strong. I was so fucking proud that he was my best friend. I couldn’t have asked for anyone better.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so another quicker update. I also had this idea bouncing around in my head, but I think it came out better in my head, so please let me know what you think of it. It seems sort of rushed, I know, and there's a lot going on, but it's complete.
> 
> It's also slightly out of character, but I tweeked it, (no pun intended), to serve my own purposes. 
> 
> I go to community college, and so I don't have a 'president' that I can just visit casually. I don't even know if that's a thing that can happen, so forgive my ignorance. 
> 
> Also, I'm terrible at writing physical altercations, so I just used a shortcut. Hope that's okay!
> 
> So, basically, I just don't really like this chapter, but I hope you enjoy it!


	10. There's No Excuse For Domestic Abuse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Good news! I have a benchmark predicted length of the story now! It's going to be either 25 or 26 chapters, or thereabouts. I have the gist of the what's gonna happen for the rest of the story now. I'm not going to change the __/__ chapter section part thing, because I'm not sure if it's going to change, and I don't want to confuse anybody. 
> 
> Okay, anyway! I hope you like this chapter! Thanks for reading, and making it this far!

The first thing I noticed the morning after the fight was that my knuckles were throbbing painfully. Actually, my knuckles were probably the reason why I woke up in the first place; as soon as I flexed my hand, a sharp pain shot through my knuckles and I winced. It took a few seconds of serious mental feeling around, before I determined that, thank _fuck_ , my knuckles weren’t broken. Just bruised to hell and back, twice. As much as I preached about proper fighting technique, I guess I was too pissed off to remember how to hold my fists, because that was the first time I had fucked up my knuckles in all the time I’d been fighting.

I sat up slowly, rubbing at my eyes with my free, unbruised hand, yawning tiredly. It was still somewhat dark outside, but that made sense, considering it was closing in on halfway through October, but there was hardly a chill in the air at all. It was Friday, and, when I glanced at my phone, I realized I had woken up an entire hour before I had to. But, I was already up, even if I was extremely tired, and I had a feeling I wouldn’t have been able to fall back asleep even if I tried.

I glanced over in the direction of Tweek’s bed, and saw that the man in question was already awake, and drawing in his notebook. (He tended to do that a lot, I’d noticed, but he was always very secretive about what he was drawing, and whenever I asked, he just stuttered out a quick, “Nothing,” so I dropped it.)

But, although that was the first thing I noticed, it was definitely not the most important.

There was a gross, purple bruise on his cheek. I frowned at the sight of it; it was probably really painful, but he was just sitting up straight, his back leaning against the wall, and drawing away like the side of his face _wasn’t_ a violent shade of violet.

I spoke before I even realized I was speaking, and there was an embarrassing amount of concern in my voice. “Tweek, Jesus Christ, your face!”

Tweek twitched violently, and his pen flew out of his hand as he “GAH! Craig!”’d loudly, which was quickly followed by a pained groan and a shiver running through his body, and he put a hand to his stomach. He closed his eyes for a few seconds, and I guessed he was just processing the pain, before he opened his eyes and glared at me. “Don’t do that!"

My frown deepened. “I’m sorry, Tweek, but that bruise is a lot worse than I thought it was gonna be!” I sounded more worried than I originally thought I felt, so I looked away for a moment, scratching my head underneath my hat. It was hard to take in, you know. I mean, just the day before that I had gotten into one of the most violent fights in my life, and it was because I was protecting someone. There were only two other occasions where I got in a fight that was actually, (in retrospect), justified.

The first happened when I was in ninth grade, and had just moved to Middle Town. I was walking home from school by myself, when I passed by an alley on Main Street. I heard crying, and I immediately recognized who it was, and it made my heart drop to my stomach. It was my sister, Tricia, and she was curled into a ball and crying softly into her dress. I was by her side in an instant, and, when I managed to calm her down enough to be able to speak, (which took fucking forever, because I’ve always been terrible at calming other people down), she told me that a couple of eighth graders had taken this beat-up old stuffed dog that she normally kept in her backpack, and ran away with it.

The thing to know about my sister is that she is almost exactly like me, and like all the Tuckers before her. She’s blunt, she’s unemotional, and she doesn’t take shit. But, even though she tries to hide it, she’s probably the most sentimental person in the entire world, even if she _is_ Satan reincarnated. And that stuffed dog was given to her by her best friend back from South Park, Karen McCormick. Those two were fucking _inseparable_ , even if they were a couple years apart in age. Karen sort of took Tricia in, the same way I had taken Tweek in, and, despite the fact that Tricia played it off that she didn’t care, Tricia really missed her a whole fucking lot. I don’t know when, or if, that phase ended, but Tricia used to sleep with that fucking thing every night.

If I didn’t hate her, I would’ve felt bad.

But Tricia was devastated that someone had taken that stuffed dog, and that moment was the first time I’d seen Tricia cry since she was a baby. She clung to me and buried her face into my neck, and told me all about how much she missed Karen, and how much she hated Middle Town, and about how she just wanted everything to go back to normal. She said she was going crazy. She said she couldn’t take it anymore.

As soon as that last part left her mouth, something in me hardened. I was already hugging her, and had been for a while as she was gushing shit to me, but I gripped her even tighter, and put my chin on top of her braided hair. I told her to tell me who did it, and, when she stopped crying and asked why I wanted to know, I assured her I was _just_ going to scare them.

And, I mean, I wasn’t lying. They _were_ scared. But there were more fists involved than I let Tricia believe there would be.

And the second time was back in South Park. (I mention it being the second time, because I hesitate telling anyone about it to begin with. _Chronologically_ , it came first, but it seemed . . . bigger than just standing up for my sister. Standing up for my sister is, was, and forever will be expected of me, but what I did in South Park was . . . not.)

I was a fifth grader, and pretty much the exact same person I had been in fourth grade, and third grade, and every grade and stage since birth. So you’d think I wouldn’t have cared when I accidentally stumbled in on an already-happening fight while I was on my way back to class from the bathroom. And I normally wouldn’t have, but I did hesitate just a second, because it was a two-against-one fight, between a couple of new-kid sixth graders and that Scott kid, the one with the diabetes. I recognized the fact that the fight wasn’t even remotely fair, but I couldn’t bring myself to care enough to stop it.

But then I . . . heard something.

To this day, I’m not quite sure what was running through my mind that afternoon, because it was like a switch had suddenly been flipped inside me, with no explanation, and I almost completely lost control of my actions.

One of the sixth graders said, “ _This_ is what happens to faggots that bump into us in the hallway . . . isn’t that right Brian?”

To which Brian said, “That’s right, Mike. This is our town now, and _our_ town is not going to be overrun by disgusting little queers --”

I don’t know if you know much about that Scott kid, but he also had a lisp and asthma, so he couldn’t really talk even if he wanted to, but he didn’t have to worry about that for long, because I was on those sixth graders’ asses in two seconds flat.

I almost lost that fight. It was before I started boxing, so I was pretty much just running on adrenaline, what muscles I managed to maintain from the sports I played, and pure, unadulterated rage. I was a bloody mess by the time the fight was over, but, then again, so were they. The only difference was that _they_ were unconscious.

As I sat on the floor, panting, trying to catch my breath, I looked over at the kid I had saved, and he was staring at me with wide eyes, his mouth opening and closing as he tried to figure out something to say.

I held up a hand before he could say anything. “Don’t,” I warned dangerously. “Take this as a God-send, mention it to no one, and get the fuck out of here.”

Scott looked like he was going to protest, but I just glared at him, and he eventually nodded, collecting his books that were scattered on the floor, and he hurried on his way.

Holy shit, tangent. Spending so much time with Tweek was apparently making me super wordy.

Whatever.

So, anyway, my subconscious had apparently grouped Tweek in with my actual family. Great. And that altercation involving the Scott kid was an outlier to my record, so I tended to just pretend it didn’t happen, but, either way, the fight I got in to protect Tweek, and my debate as to _why_ I had decided to beat up four guys at the same time, was actually sort of a . . . difficult pill to swallow. It was unexpected, at the very least.

So I sighed slowly, and observed Tweek for a few seconds, taking note of any twitch of pain in his face whenever he moved, before I said, “Let me look at it.”

Tweek looked up at that, a nervous expression all over his face, and he shook his head. “What? No, you don’t have to --”

“Too bad,” I said, pushing the covers off of my body and rising to my feet. Because I had such a startling beginning to my day, (due to Tweek’s louder-than-normal screeching, and the fact that my knuckles were killing me), I didn’t stumble tiredly, and my eyes felt light as a feather. Tweek just stared at me as I crossed the room, his back pressed against the wall tightly, and his eyes wide and unwavering.

When I got to him, I sat down beside him on the bed, and reached my not-bruised hand, (I didn’t know how he’d react to my fucked up hand, so I tried to hide it in the pocket of my nighttime sweatshirt), and gingerly touched his cheek, hard enough to see if there was any swelling, but soft enough to not hurt him. His eyes flicked away briefly, before he turned his gaze back to me. I only glanced shortly into his eyes, but cleared my throat and reverted my attention to his cheek again when my stomach _clanged_ and I got too flustered to maintain the innocent contact.

“It’s not too swollen,” I said, my voice embarrassingly husky. “Just bruised. And gross.”

Tweek looked away again. “Oh. Good. NGH! -- It’s . . . just, I . . . it didn’t really . . . I kinda tried not to touch it . . .” He let out a breath, looking at me again, and gave me a small, barely detectable smile. “Thank you, Craig.” His voice was softer, slightly broken, but undoubtedly grateful, but I just wasn’t fucking having it, shaking my head in response.

“You don’t have to thank me, Tweek, I already told you. Watching over you was what I agreed to do weeks ago. Just because something actually happened, doesn’t mean I need any thanks.”

Tweek hesitated. “But --”

My hand shifted so that I was cupping his cheek gently. “Stop it, Tweek, seriously. I’m going to start ignoring you if you keep trying to thank me.”

He looked shyly at me under his thick blonde eyelashes, and, in that moment, I wished I _hadn’t_ noticed that he had thick eyelashes, because it made the whole situation . . . weirder than I normally would’ve found it. Which was pretty fucking weird, considering I was just _holding_ his face and staring at him with intent eyes.

Speaking of, do you ever just sort of look at someone and feel like you’re seeing them as this completely new person?

Yeah.

For a while before that, I had seen Tweek as this being that I needed to protect and defend because he was virtually incapable of doing that himself, but, ever since the afternoon before, even though we hadn’t left out dorm room since the fight, I had decided that beneath my wing was where he was going to stay for as long as him and I were friends. I wouldn’t stand to watch him get the shit beat out of him again. He was _going_ to be safe, dammit. And, in that moment, that protective feeling just intensified.

I cleared my throat after a few seconds, before releasing him and looking away. “How’re your other bruises?”

Tweek got the hint, and I heard him move away from me, too. “GAH! Uh . . . my stomach hurts if I move too quickly, but they’re not that bad.”

Okay, so I didn’t believe him for a second that they weren’t bad, but I was _not_ going to ask to see his stomach. That’s fucking weird, and I assumed he could take care of that part himself. “Are you up for going to class?”

Tweek nodded his head wildly, instantly succumbing to panic at, presumably, the thought of skipping. “GAH! I can’t miss class!” Tweek reached up and buried his fingers in his hair. “I’ll get behind, and none of my homework will be any good, and I’ll fail my final exam, and I’ll end up dropping out and resorting to living on the streets of Detroit, begging strangers for change!”

I blinked a few times at him, trying to soak in his reasoning, before giving up, and nodding. “Okay, if you’re sure. I’ll leave my class extra early so that you don’t have to wait.”

Tweek was silent for a few seconds, which was actually super weird, because Tweek was pretty much never quiet. He pointedly averted my gaze, fiddling nervously with this shirt cuffs, and then finally let out a long sigh, and said quietly, in a surprisingly _not_ shaky voice, “Craig, you’re a really good friend.”

“Yeah, well . . .” I trailed off, unsure of how to respond. Instead, I just climbed to my feet, and walked over to my bed, preparing to get dressed for class. But then I looked at my phone, and saw that I still had, like, a long time before class started, so I turned back to Tweek, and said, “Wanna watch a couple episodes of Red Racer before class?”

Tweek nodded happily, and said, “NGH! Okay!” and he climbed to his feet and turned to his coffee maker.

I took that as a cue to start setting up the TV and the DVD player, and just as I was doing so, I heard an irritated grunt coming from Tweek’s side of the room, followed by a harsh, “GAH! Goddammit!”

I glanced at him over my shoulder. “What is it, Tweek?”

Tweek let out a few anxious, annoyed noises before spitting out, “I must’ve left my coffee mug behind yesterday.”

I turned back to what I was doing, decided that I could multitask, and solve Tweek’s problem at the same time as getting us set up for a mini Red Racer marathon. “Do you think it’ll still be there?” Of course it wouldn’t, but I figured I’d ask anyway.

“GAH! NGH! No . . .” Tweek let out a rough breath, before I heard him add, “That’s okay, I have a few extras.”

I wasn't even remotely surprised by that at all.

And then, just like that, the coffee maker whirred to life, and it was as if the problem had never existed in the first place.

* * *

I left to pick Tweek up fifteen minutes before my class was supposed to end, because I was determined not to have Tweek wait for me to show up. No way in hell, never again. His class wasn’t even out yet when I showed up, so I had to wait a couple of minutes before the heavy doors to the English building opened, and people started pouring out.

The first people that left were those four assholes from yesterday. I didn’t realize Tweek had more than one class with them, and I immediately assumed a defensive position should they have tried anything, but they took one look at me, and ducked their heads down, muttering to themselves and pulling each other in the opposite direction.

I smirked. I was feared. It was a good feeling.

About fifty people in total left the building before I saw who I was waiting for. Tweek was walking more nervously than normal, his head jerking to the side periodically and his legs carrying him in robotic, stiff steps forward. His eyes were on his feet, a large paper-back book and a three-inch binder pressed flush to his chest, and his nasty purple bruise was shining in the late morning sunlight.

I hurried over to him, and said, quietly so as not to scare him,  “Hey, Tweek.”

Tweek did his normal, “GAH!” thing, before he caught my eye and let out a long, deep breath. “Oh. Hi, Craig.”

I smiled and repeated, “Hey. How was class?”

“NGH! -- Long, boring, and I hate reading,” Tweek grumbled, his eyes narrowed in irritation. “What about you?”

“Long, boring, and I hate biology,” I said, gesturing with my head that we should start walking. He followed after me. “I didn’t know you had any other classes with those assholes,” I observed.

“GAH! NGH! Yeah . . .” Tweek said somberly.

“Did they do anything?”

Tweek shrugged. “Not really. They pretty much just ignored me, but I caught them glaring at me every once in awhile.”

I rolled my eyes. There wasn’t much I could do about them glaring, but, considering the fact that they seemed to be actually scared of me, I figured they wouldn’t do anything to Tweek anymore. They were probably just bitter about being beat up by a ‘faggot.’ “Well, good. At least they’re leaving you alone now.”

“GAH! EHH! Being ignored is so much better than not being ignored.”

I nodded with a grin. “Tweek, that is my life motto.”

“Wanna know my life motto?”

I was instantly intrigued, and said, “Let me guess. _Keep Calm and Drink Coffee_.”

Tweek rolled his eyes. “You’re probably the only human being on earth that still makes _Keep Calm_ jokes.”

“But it fit the occasion, though, didn’t it?”

“I mean, I guess --”

I interrupted him. “Right, so I was right, right?”

He laughed. “No, you were way wrong.”

“Okay, then, what is it?”

There was a look of utmost amusement on Tweek’s face as he shot a smirk in my direction. “I’m good enough. I’m smart enough. And --”

“Doggone it, people like me,” I finished with him, my voice slightly exasperated. “I have no fucking clue why you like Stuart Smalley so much, dude.”

Tweek shrugged. “He’s a good guy. He just wants the world to be a happy place.”

“He’s a sarcastic shithead.”

“So are you.”

“Thanks.”

“Anytime.”

I smiled, moving my biology textbook from one arm to the other. God, hanging out with Tweek was just so fucking fun sometimes --

Tweek shrieked suddenly, and I nearly jumped out my shoes in surprise. It was completely unprovoked, but, when I looked over at him, I saw that his eyes were fixed on my hand. I followed his gaze and groaned. I had meant to keep _that_ away from him. “GAH! Craig! Your hand!”

I sighed, almost frustrated with myself for having been caught. “Yeah. I bruised my knuckles.”

My explanation did nothing to calm Tweek down. He squealed again, his arms flailing in his sudden passion, and he exclaimed, “Jesus Christ! Why didn’t you tell me earlier?”

I shrugged, tucking my bruised hand into my coat pocket. “Because I didn’t know if you’d freak out or not.”

“Well, Jesus, man, duh!” he said, whapping me on the back of the head. I frowned at him, rubbing the spot where he’d slapped me, and I was about to say something along the lines of, “What the fuck, dude?” when he grabbed hold of the wrist of my bruised hand, which was just barely peeking out from my pocket, and started dragging me at a quicker pace.

“I always keep bandages and gauze in my duffel bag,” he stated firmly. “I’m wrapping your hand when we get back to our dorm room.”

Tweek said it with so much determination and ferocity, that I thought it unwise to go against him, so I allowed myself to be pulled without a word.

The walk back was otherwise uneventful. Tweek didn’t let me go for a second, his trembling fingers clinging fast to my wrist, and every time I looked over at him, he was wearing a deep-set frown. He didn’t even let go when we made it to the foot of the stairs, he just clambered up them with me in tow, like a dog on a leash.

Tweek was the one who unlocked the door that time ‘round, (which actually was a pretty rare phenomena; it usually took Tweek much longer than it took me to get the key in the lock), and he was the one who closed it behind us. He was treating me like I had completely shattered my hand in the fight, rather than just bruising a couple knuckles, but he was so adamant about ‘taking care of me’, that I didn’t dare say anything.

Tweek’s hands trembled slightly as he wrapped my fist in a long white bandage, but he was also meticulous and careful at the same time. It really seemed like he had experience with taking care of injuries, and I wasn’t sure if I should be angry about that or not, because on the one hand, his mother or father might’ve been a nurse, on top of owning a coffee shop, (a possibility that didn’t seem very plausible), but on the other hand, he also might’ve been beaten up a lot and forced to take of his own wounds.

I had decided to just leave it be for the time being.

Tweek and I hardly had to speak. We just mutually decided that we were going to watch Red Racer. It was more  of a ‘tilted head, reassuring nod’ situation, and, within no time, me and my bandaged hand were setting up the TV for a Red Racer marathon, and Tweek was arranging the furniture into our familiar fort.

* * *

We were about two episodes in, and, just as another was starting, there was a knock at our dorm room door. I shared a confused look with Tweek; we had had literally no visitors since I had brought Clyde with me that one time, so I really had no idea who the fuck it could be. It was kind of an unspoken agreement that I was going to be the one to answer whoever was calling, (because yeah fucking _right_ Tweek was going to talk to a mystery-box person that ‘could’ve been a rapist or a serial killer’), so I climbed to my feet off of the mattress, and went to see who it was.

Before I opened the door, however, I turned to Tweek and said, “If you don’t want to explain your bruise, you should probably hide your face.”

Tweek “GAH!”’d, but nodded, covering his face with both hands, like he did when he wanted to give me my fucking _advanced privacy_ every morning. I was gonna tell him that maybe doing it like that would be a bit suspicious, but I was actually a little amused by his position, so I let it slide. He looked like a kid playing hide and seek, living by the ‘if I can’t see them, they can’t see me’ logic.

I didn’t think to use the peephole, instead just opening the door indifferently, and who I met with was somewhat of a surprise, but almost not a surprise at all.

“‘Sup fags, what’s going on?”

Goddammit. Like I really wanted to see _Cartman_ of all people. I frowned at him, and saw that, standing beside him with a bright grin on his face, was Clyde. I frowned at him, too. “What are you two assholes doing here?”

Cartman smirked, pushing past me into Tweek and my dorm room. “Tweek forgot his mug yesterday, so I had Clyde show me where your dorm is so I could give it back. And can’t I just visit my very good friends?”

I frowned. “No, you can’t. Because we’re not friends.”

“Oh, Craig, I’m so hurt,” Cartman said, holding a hand to his heart. “What ever did I do to deserve such treatment?”

“You exist,” I said blankly.

Cartman just rolled his eyes and didn’t answer, instead flinging the metal coffee mug in Tweek’s direction, and, because Tweek was hiding his entire face, (therefore not seeing what was happening), the mug collided with his stomach. He let out a pained shriek, his hands dropping from his face, and he clutched his abdomen. I was across the room and beside him in the fort in an instant.

When I was sure Tweek was going to be okay, and just as I was about to yell at Cartman, he exclaimed, “Whoa! What the hell happened to you?”

Cartman, having gotten used to Tweek ignoring him, or just generally being too nervous to respond, turned to me for answers instead, but the bandage around my right fist caught his eye, and, rather than waiting for me to answer, he turned back to Tweek with a raised eyebrow. “You know, Tweek, spousal abuse is never okay. If you need help, don’t be afraid to ask for it. And remember: _there’s no excuse for domestic abuse_ \--”

I rolled my eyes and huffed in irritation. “I didn’t hit him,” I said in a flat, unimpressed voice. “I actually completely fucked up the guys who _did_.”

“ _Guys_?” Clyde asked doubtfully. “You took on more than one guy and _won_?”

I shrugged. “I’ve been boxing since I was thirteen.” I was getting kind of sick of people assuming I _couldn’t_ take on more than one guy and win. That wasn’t even the first time I’d done it. “And I guess, Cartman, you know them, too. They’re pussies with no fighting instincts. They just prey on the people they know they can take in a fight.”

I _felt_ Tweek’s glare, so I corrected myself. “I mean _collectively_ , Tweek. I’m sure if you set your mind to it, _you_ could beat _them_ , individually. With _that_ right hook . . .”

“Yeah, right,” Cartman said with an eye roll. “Who the hell did that to you anyway? Your face looks like an over-sized grape.”

I looked over to Tweek, and nodded expectantly, because _I_ had no idea who they were, but I knew that Cartman would know. They all had physics together. Tweek looked back over to me, and realized he would actually have to speak in the presence of Cartman, as a part of the actual conversation. He started shaking a little bit more than usual, and managed out, “Mitch, Ricky, Samuel, and Martin --”

“Holy fuck, Craig!” Cartman exclaimed, turning to me with wide eyes. “You beat _them_ up? At the same time? _By yourself?_ ”

I shrugged and nodded. “Yeah. Why? Is that a big deal?”

“That’s a huge fucking deal! Those guys were on the varsity football team, the varsity basketball team, _and_ the varsity baseball team! Ricky was the captain of fucking everything! They’re more jacked than Satan! How’d you do it?”

Jesus, I wasn’t used to praise from Cartman. I almost didn’t know how to respond, so I just answered as I would a technical question to the actual art of boxing itself. “It doesn’t matter how strong they are,” I said blankly. As soon as I’d said that, I realized the idiocy of the statement, so I shook my head and added, “I mean, yes, it does, but, like I said before, they had no fighting instinct. That’s kind of important when you’re fighting someone.”

“Dude, Craig, I take back saying that Middle Town turned you into a total pussy,” Clyde said finally, having been silent for the majority of my explanation. “You are officially the most badass person I’ve ever met.”

I rolled my eyes. “Can we just drop it please?”

“Probably not,” Cartman said with a snort. “Because all the guys are gonna ask about it.”

Tweek let out an especially loud, especially anxious screech noise, so I just reached far behind me, grabbed his coffee mug from his bedside table, and put it in his hands, making sure he wasn't going to drop it, before I sat back down again. Cartman and Clyde were just staring at me with expecting, curious eyes, as if they were waiting for an answer, but nothing came to mind, so I cleared my throat uncomfortably. “Well, now that you dropped off Tweek’s mug, you assholes can leave, right?”

“Naw, everybody will be here in a minute, anyway,” Clyde said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “I texted all the guys, telling them to meet us here.”

“You texted everybody our dorm room number?” I asked Clyde, my eyes narrowing accusingly. “Why?”

“So they could all drop in and see you two gaywads whenever they want,” Clyde said with a shrug.

Before I could answer, Cartman suddenly said in a slow voice, “Wait . . . did you text Kahl?”

Clyde raised an eyebrow at him. “Um . . . no? I thought you were going to do that?”

Cartman let out a long breath, and pinched the bridge of his nose in a very Stan-like manner. “Ah, shit. Well, Kahl’s gonna be pissed, then. I was supposed to meet him at the library, uh . . .” Cartman pulled his phone out of his pocket and whistled at the time. “Fifteen minutes ago. He’ll think I bailed on him. Goddammit, Clyde . . .”

“Hey, it’s not _my_ fault!” Clyde protested angrily. “He’s _your_ boyfriend!”

“Yeah, but I just assumed because you were telling everyone else that you’d tell Kahl, too!” Cartman let out a rough sigh. “Whatever, I’ll text him now.”

While Cartman was busy digging his phone from his coat pocket and typing away to Kyle, I turned to Clyde, who leaned against the doorframe casually and was looking around the room, obviously bored. I called his attention to me by asking blankly, “Okay, so why didn’t you guys just come together as a group?” I asked blankly. “That way, we’d have to deal with all this bullshit all at once, and then we could kick you guys out and never talk to you again.”

Before Clyde could answer, Cartman had already finished his text, and was putting his phone back in his pocket, so the fatass said casually, “I wanted to see if I could catch you guys dry humping or something, and Clyde just happened to be hanging around the math building, and wanted to come.”

“That’s dumb,” I said, my voice flat and my stare unimpressed.

“But valid,” Clyde observed.

“Totally,” Cartman said, nodding his fat head in agreement. “You two are so gay for each other, it puts me and Kahl to shame --”

“Knock it off, Cartman --” I said, my voice purposefully void of emotion, so that he wouldn’t get to hear how pissed off he was making me.

“No, I’m seriously,” he continued nonchalantly. “You guys are like two dicks permanently attached at the head --”

“Cartman, quit being an asshole,” a new, very angry sounding voice interrupted, and I almost thanked God that Kyle had such good timing when it came to his dicky boyfriend. The tight-eyebrowed daywalker appeared in my doorway, his arms folded over his chest and a deep frown on his face. “We were supposed to meet at the library. What the hell happened? And why is it that I heard where we were all supposed to be . . . from fucking _Stan_?”

Cartman tried to bring an arm around Kyle’s shoulders, but Kyle sidestepped away from him, deepening his glare. Cartman rolled his eyes. “I just wanted to see if these two assholes were secretly fucking.”

“Well? Are they?” Stan asked, suddenly appearing behind Kyle. He caught sight of Tweek and sucked in a breath through the corners of his mouth. “Jesus, what happened?”

“Craig defended Tweek’s honor by beating up The Dick Brothers,” Cartman said with an obnoxious laugh. Judging by the shocked looks on everybody’s faces, they all knew what the term The Dick Brothers was referring to.

“Holy shit, seriously?” Kenny asked, shoving his way past Kyle and Stan to catch sight of Tweek’s face. “By _yourself_?”

I shrugged, and nodded.

Cartman sighed, mockingly disappointed, and added, “And I was _sure_ they’d be having celebratory sex, but it seems like Clyde and I were too late for the show --”

Kyle’s reaction to that was immediately; he scowled harshly and punched Cartman on the shoulder. “Fuck you, fatass! I’m _sick_ of your shit! In case you haven’t noticed, you already _have_ a boyfriend, who was waiting for you to show up at the library for twenty fucking minutes, while _you_ were off trying to sneak a peek at two guys, who aren’t even fucking dating!”

Everybody cringed at the high frequency in which Kyle was screaming. Kenny even clapped his hands to his ears and said under his breath, “ _Fuck, man . . ._ ” Kyle was fucking _pissed_ , and I’m pretty sure the entire third floor knew it, too.

Cartman looked away, his brow furrowed tightly in concentration, as if he were trying to come up with a way to shut Kyle the fuck up before his screeching shattered the window of Tweek and my dorm room.

But Pissed Kyle didn’t seem to be finished yet. “What the fuck is wrong with you, Cartman?! You _always_ do shit like this! Give me one reason why we’re still dating, you racist, anti-Semitic, heartless _asshole_ \--”

Cartman gripped Kyle’s shoulders in his hands and kissed him directly on the mouth, making _me_ almost gag, and the entire room make audible, grossed-out noises. Kyle remained rigid for a few seconds, before he started kissing back, his arms glued to his sides and his eyes half-closed.

After a few seconds, Cartman pulled back, giving Kyle as close to a sincere smile as I’m sure that fatass was capable of. “I don’t really give a fuck about Craig and Tweek. They’re total douche bags, and can fuck each other to death for all I care. The only piece of ass I want is _yours_ , you insufferable Jew.”

For some reason, that actually put a slow smile on Kyle’s face, however small, as Cartman’s arms slithered from Kyle’s shoulders to Kyle’s waist. I guess Broflovski wasn’t convinced yet, because, although he did look considerably less angry than he had been before, he still didn’t make a move to reciprocate any acts of affection, nor did he even say anything at all. He just watched Cartman with thoughtful eyes, waiting to see what that fatass was going to do to try to redeem himself next.

“Don’t be mad, Kyle,” Cartman continued, nuzzling their cheeks together. And he actually pronounced Kyle’s name the _right_ way, something that I hadn’t heard him do once since I’d been forced into their company again. “My sweet little Jew baby, you know I didn’t mean to make you angry, don’t you?” Despite the fact that his words indicated he was speaking to a small child, Cartman’s voice didn’t actually sound like he was babying Kyle. He sounded more like soothing lover.

Fuck, I wish I never combined the word ‘lover’ with the phrase ‘Kyle and Cartman’ at all, because it was burning a hole in my brain.

“Come on, you love me too much to stay mad, and you know it . . . If you forgive me, I’ll do that _thing_ that you really like --”

“Jesus Christ, _alright_ ,” Kyle said, rolling his eyes, and allowing himself to be brought into Cartman’s grip. “I forgive you for being an asshole, for probably the millionth time. Just . . . don’t do it again. I was seriously about to punch you in the face for a second there.”

“And risk ruining my perfect complexion?” Cartman said smugly. “I don’t think so, you filthy Jewrat.”

“I honestly have no idea why the fuck I even like you --”

“Okay, so, anyway,” Clyde announced loudly, interrupting their . . . moment?, to say, “We’re here for a reason, remember? There’s a party at the frat house tonight, and we were gonna get dinner before heading over. Craig, you’re coming even if I have to lure you out with vodka, and, Tweek, I know you’re terrified of sunlight, and people in general, but you’re invited, too.”

I rolled my eyes. Did Clyde really think Tweek would say yes? “Clyde, did you not notice the huge fucking bruise --”

“GAH! NGH! I’ll go,” Tweek interrupted, and, when I looked at him in surprise, (I really, honestly didn’t expect him to say yes, and I think that assumption was fair), I saw that his eyes were trained on my face, a weird hopefulness in his gaze that I momentarily didn’t understand. That is, until he said to me, “EHH! Are you coming?”

I forced a blush away, but before I could answer, Cartman jeered,

“Aww, how cute! Kahl, why can’t our relationship be like that?”

Kyle rolled his eyes. “Two reasons: 1), Craig and Tweek aren’t dating, and 2), you and I are constantly on the verge of killing each other. Our relationship is nothing more than bitter hatred and angry sex.”

For the good of the group, Tweek, of all people, interrupted the argument, saying, “GAH! I’m not going if Cartman’s going to be an asshole.”

Everybody was 100% stunned into silence. Nobody expected the twitchy, five-and-a-half foot tall man-child to call Cartman out on his bullshit.

Cartman blinked. And then scowled. And then said, “Eh! Who are you calling an asshole, you tweeky meth head?”

I don’t know what I expected, but let’s just say I wasn’t surprised that Tweek didn’t appreciate the comment. I was, however, surprised by the insanely dark look in his eyes as he frowned at the fucking asshole who was leaning against the drywall. I mean, I wouldn’t have liked being called a tweeky meth head, myself, but I mostly wouldn’t have cared. It wasn’t that offensive to me. Tweek, on the other hand, looked like he was about three seconds away from choking Cartman out.

“Don’t call me that,” Tweek said, his voice the steadiest I’d ever heard it, and his hands balled into fists on his lap. This was him when I first called him a spaz, times a million. “I’m not a meth head. I have an anxiety disorder, but I don’t do meth. Don’t _ever_ say that to me again.”

“Alright, Jesus Christ,” Cartman said, his eyes wide in shock. I was pretty much in the same state. “I won’t say it again, just calm your tits.”

Cartman’s demand that Tweek calm down was lost on him, and he actually started fucking _vibrating_ on his mattress. As a reflex, I reached a hand out, clapping him on the shoulder tightly and held him still. I wasn’t caught off guard that he calmed down at my touch, (him and I were used to it), but nobody else in the room besides Kenny had even a clue that I was capable of comforting anyone. They all practically gaped at me, and Clyde even said, his voice full of awe, “Craig . . . are you willingly touching another human being?”

I promptly removed my hand. “No,” I answered. “I was willingly touching Tweek.”

I had successfully caught Tweek’s attention, and he scowled at me, punching me hard on the shoulder. “Stop being a dick.”

I grinned at him, despite the fact that that fucking hurt, and absently rubbed the spot where he had punched me. He really was stronger than he looked, and had really taken a liking to jabbing me in the exact same spot every single time. “I’m not being a dick. I’m calming you down. It working?”

Tweek’s face softened, and he grinned back at me. “Yeah.”

It was Clyde that time who cooed ridiculously, and said, “Tweek, dude, seriously, you’ve _gotta_ tell me your secret. I was Craig’s best friend for twelve years, and he only smiled at me a total of five times. And he made physical contact, like, twice. You just straight up got both, like it was no big deal.”

“That’s because it _is_ no big deal,” I said. “You guys are the ones making it a big deal.”

“Ehhh, I don’t know,” Kenny said, his voice pitched up like he was contemplating something. “You _are_ Craig Fucker.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Meaning?”

“ _Meaning_ you care about no _body_ and no _thing_ ,” Clyde answered. “Even the people you like.”

I was beyond lost. “That doesn’t make any sense.”

“That . . . actually _does_ make sense,” Kyle added, his voice slower and more thoughtful. “I mean, Clyde’s right. Back when you still lived in South Park, you were either off somewhere by yourself doing something, or you were all closed off and indifferent when we were all hanging out together. You never did and never _would_ have smiled at one of us just like _that_ \--”

“Goddamnit, stop psychoanalyzing me!” I said angrily. Fuck, my biggest pet peeve in the entire universe was when people just started shoving their noses where noses don’t belong. Normally, I just wouldn’t give a shit, but those assholes were seriously getting on my nerves, and, even though Tweek was in the room, I was not going to censor my rage, because, seriously fuck those guys. “This whole interaction is completely unprovoked; I was just innocently sitting here, and you guys just --”

“Jesus Christ, someone call an ambulance, it sounds like the sand in Craig’s vagina is about to blow,” Cartman said in mock seriousness.

“Yeah, seriously, dude, chill out,” Stan said, rolling his eyes.

I was about to tell them off when Tweek leaned in and whispered to me in his shaky voice, “Craig, man, you look so pissed off right now.”

I glanced at him, briefly taking in his wide-eyed, and yet somehow also blank-faced expression, and, realizing that he didn't actually want to be talking around them, _whispered_ back, “That’s because they piss me off.”

“So, uh . . . _are_ you going to the party?”

I raised an eyebrow at him. “I kind of have to.”

Tweek’s face fell into confusion. “Why?”

I rolled my eyes. “Because _you_ agreed to first, and I’m not leaving you alone with these assholes --”

He frowned. “I was only going to go if _you_ were --”

“Well, _I_ was only going because you already said _you_ were --”

“Should we say we don’t want to go anymore?”

“I fucking want to, but we already said yes, and these assholes would just drag us out by our thumbs --”

Tweek deflated, and looked away. “Shit, you’re right.”

“But maybe we can just sneak out when they’re all shitfaced and can’t tell their dicks from their shoelaces --”

At that, Tweek sat up again, and nodded at me. “Okay!”

“You maybe wanna include us in our whatever faggy conversation you guys are having over there?” Cartman asked in a blank voice.

I blinked, turning away from Tweek. I had almost forgotten they were there. “Oh, uh. Yeah. So, what are we doing for dinner?”

“Fatass wants to go to the all-you-can-eat buffet on 4th street,” Stan said with an eyeroll.

“Eh!” Cartman said, scowling. “They’re home to the so-called ‘best ribs in the state’, and I want to see if that’s bullcrap!”

Kyle smirked. “You are such a fat turd, you know that, Cartman?”

“At least my mini me isn’t missing his head,” Cartman said, yanking the flap of Kyle’s ushanka. Kyle let out an unimpressed grunt, but I just huffed, deciding I’d had enough of their shit for the time being. It was bad enough that I had to go to dinner, and then a party with them, I didn’t want their bullshit stinking up my dorm room.

I folded my arms over my chest and said blankly, leveling a stare at Cartman’s fat face, “Please don’t talk about your dicks.”

“Yeah, I bet you and Tweek do that enough on our own,” Cartman said with an obnoxious laugh.

Before anybody could say anything, the following words, in smooth song form, lit up the entire dorm room:

_“Shawty you’re my angel, you’re my darlin’ angel --”_

I was really fucking confused for like three seconds, before Kenny started pretty much bouncing up and down, and fished his phone from his pocket, turning away, and calling over his shoulder, “That’s my boyfriend, gotta go!” and he was gone before anybody could say anything.

There was silence for like five solid seconds before Stan said, “I really, _really_ want to know who he’s dating. It’s been driving me insane for the past year.”

“He’s obviously faking,” Cartman said with an eyeroll. “I mean, who would want to get stuck dating Kenny Mc _Poor_ mick? That’s like signing up for a lifetime of poptarts and disappointment.”

“Yeah, well, dating you is like signing up for a lifetime of fart jokes, failed attempts at world domination, and disappointment, so it’s not like you can judge anyone,” Kyle said in a casual voice, leaning into Cartman’s huge body.

Stan let out this dramatic sigh, and said, “Yeah, and getting stuck dating Wendy is like a lifetime of _heartbreak_ and disappointment.”

There was a beat of tense silence, before Cartman broke it, saying in a blunt voice, “Kahl, remind me later to chop Stan’s dick in half.”

Stan shrugged. “What, I’m just saying --”

“Don’t even fucking go there,” Clyde interrupted, rolling his eyes. “I thought you said you guys broke up, _once and for all_?”

“It’s . . .” Stan pinched the bridge of his nose. “Complicated.”

“It’s _always_ complicated,” Clyde said, shooting me an exasperated look. For once, I agreed with him. Stan was being a pussy. Again.

The aforementioned pussy huffed childishly. “Well, it’s more complicated than it usually is.”

I glanced over at Tweek to see how he was fairing with the conversation, but he looked surprisingly calm. He was shaking, obviously, and he was still making his little anxious noises, (it’d come to be like background noise, and I ceased to really notice it, unless he stopped), but his face wasn’t twisted in sheer panic like it usually was when they argued. He actually looked . . . amused?

I guess Tweek felt my eyes on him, because he turned to look at me. We just stared at each other for a few seconds, before he leaned in and whispered, “They’re so dumb.”

I laughed quietly, nodding in agreement. “Yeah, they totally are,” I said, my voice that same hushed quiet as his. “And they’ve always been like this, too.”

“Don’t they ever get tired?”

“They have an energy reserve tank solely for the purpose of bitching at each other.”

Tweek laughed, but, unlike me, he didn’t have the untapped power to do it _quietly_ , and the loud, squeaky, giggle-like laughs drew the attention of the entire room.

Cue awkward silence.

“What the hell are you laughing at?” Cartman asked, raising an eyebrow.

Tweek clapped both hands over his mouth, while also trying to say, “Nothing!” so, although _I_ understood him, it just came out as unintelligible muffles to everybody else. You’d think being able to understand Kenny when he wore that parka all the fucking time would help, but they just stared at Tweek in confusion. But, like many times that day, someone outside of the conversation decided to jump in at just the right moment.

And the pleasant interruption was in the form of an excited Kenny, bounding through the slightly-open door with a broad grin on his face. “You guys, you guys, you guys,” he said in a quick, happy voice. “Guess what, you guys?”

“Jesus Christ, what?” Cartman asked with an annoyed frown.

“My boyfriend’s coming to visit!” Kenny exclaimed happily, clutching his phone to his heart.

“You mean we actually get to _meet_ your imaginary fucktoy?” Cartman asked with an intrigued eyebrow raise.

Kenny lowered his arms and scowled. “He’s not just a fucktoy!” he protested angrily. “He’s my boyfriend, and I love him, and he’s coming up to see everybody tonight! He’ll get to stay for an entire week!” The smile came back to Kenny’s face, almost like a gut reaction. “I can’t wait, I’m so excited, oh my God, this is going to be the best night ever --”

“How come you’re just finding out about this now?” I asked flatly.

Kenny shook himself from his sudden rant, but his eyes were alive with excitement and that involuntary smile wouldn’t leave his face. “He said it was short-notice, and he wasn’t even sure he would be able to make it, so he didn’t tell me because he didn’t want to get my hopes up. Isn’t that the sweetest thing you’ve ever heard?” Kenny practically _swooned_ where he was standing. “He’s honestly the best person in the entire world --”

“God, _enough_ ,” I said, grimacing more than I’d ever grimaced before. “I can’t take this whole . . .” I gestured in his general direction, but he still looked a little gone. “Mushy bullshit. Take it down like . . . five notches, please.”

“Well, I’m _sorry_ for being excited,” Kenny said, part of that ‘lost-in-love’ expression having evaporated. “I haven’t seen him months, that was the first call I’d gotten from him in a week, and texting him just isn’t enough!”

“When is he coming?” Kyle asked.

“He said he’s in the car right now!” Kenny exclaimed happily. “There were a few rough patches on the trip, he was coming in and out of service, and only called when he was sure it would go through.”

“How does this guy know you wouldn’t have any plans?” Cartman asked condescendingly. Jesus, he really didn’t believe Kenny. I mean, I didn’t care either way, but Cartman was _sure_ that Kenny was making that shit up.

Kenny shook his head. “I told him to visit any time he’d like. I’ll _always_ make time for him.” He let out another sigh. “Jesus fucking Christ, I love him so much . . .”

I sighed roughly. “I thought I told you to knock it off with that shit.”

Kenny smiled at me. “He can’t help that he’s the greatest human ever --”

Cartman groaned, squeezing his eyes shut in his annoyance. “You see what we’ve been dealing with for an entire year?” he said in a flat voice.

“Oh, come on,” Kenny said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “You’re all just jealous that I actually have someone.”

There was an awkward silence for a few seconds, in which Kyle and Cartman glanced at each other, and then at Kenny, who seemed blissfully unaware of how stupid his statement sounded.

Ultimately, it was Kyle who cleared his throat and said, “Uh, Kenny? Have you forgotten about some of us?”

Kenny rolled his eyes. “Yeah, but you guys don’t count.”

Cartman frowned, pulling Kyle closer to him. “Me and Kahl do too count! We’re way better than you and _your_ mythical boyfriend --”

“Once again, asshole, he’s _not_ made up --”

“Then how come we don’t know anything about him besides the fact that he’s blonde?”

“You already _know_ why, fatass --”

“Yeah, okay, can everybody shut the fuck up for a minute?” I interrupted in a loud, flat voice. I waited until everybody was looking at me before I said, “What time are we meeting for dinner?”

“You didn’t want to just hang out until then?” Stan asked casually, like he didn’t realize that he was suggesting Tweek and I hang around them for a solid ten hours, maybe even more.

Fucking delusion, dude.

I scoffed. “No fucking way. It’s enough that Tweek and I are actually going to a fucking party with you. We need time to mentally prepare for dealing with your guys’ drunk asses.”

Kenny smirked, seeming to have gotten over his sudden anger pretty quickly. “We’re meeting at 5:30. My boyfriend’s gonna meet us in the parking lot at around the same time. So that should give you and Tweek about five hours to fuck each other’s brains out before you gotta show your face in public. Think that’s enough time?”

I scowled, folding my arms over my chest. “And with that, you all can fuck off,” I said in a forcefully blank voice.

Cartman laughed obnoxiously. “Alright, alright, we’ll give you and Tweek your _precious_ sexy time. I gotta go do a little _something_ for Kahl to make up for skipping out on him, anyway.”

They all actually took the fucking hint, and turned away to leave, much to my great relief, and, according to the almost-undetectable sigh that came from Tweek’s direction, he was feeling about the same way.

As they were leaving, I heard Stan say, his voice low and shaky, “Please, for the love of all that is fucking holy, do _not_ talk about your sex life. I seriously can’t take it.”

“Aw, come on, Stan, it’s not like you don’t know all about it --”

“That doesn’t make it any _better_ , asshole --”

Kenny was the last to leave, and he turned around, wiggling his eyebrows and smirking at Tweek and I suggestively. “See you guys later,” he said with a chuckle, before closing the door behind him with a loud bang.

And then we were alone.

After a long period of silence after all the South Park assholes left, I turned to look at Tweek, who was already looking at me, and said, slowly, “So . . . guess we’re going to a party, then.”

“GAH! NGH! I guess so . . .” Tweek echoed, nodding and looking down at his coffee mug. “I’ve never been to one before. Do people really have sex . . . just . . . with _other people_ in the room?”

Okay, that made me laugh, I’ll admit it. I hadn’t realized how naive he was, but I guess I should’ve, because I couldn’t imagine him being vulgar, or crude about people fucking. He seemed like the type to get all nervous and flustered just at the notion of people screwing. Something about that thought made me smile. “I mean, if they want to, I guess so, but they usually go to a bedroom, or the bathroom, or something to do that. They don’t just . . .” I snorted. “ _Do it_ in the kitchen, or whatever you’re thinking of.”

A look of pure relief spread across Tweek’s face and he let out a long breath. “Oh, thank _God_.”

I smirked. It was going to be an . . . interesting night. I could tell.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're curious, the song that Kenny has as his boyfriend's ringtone is called "Angel," by Shaggy. I'm not even sure why I picked it, but it just made sense at the time, I guess.


	11. Platonic Soul Mates

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I would first and foremost like to apologize for this chapter. I know it's really long, and it's super busy with all sorts of stuff happening. But, for some reason, I thought it'd be nice as one chapter, so here you go. Tell me what you think about it; I know it's a lot to take in all at once!

Tweek and I spent the five hours following the departure of the South Park crew watching Red Racer and talking about how much we _didn’t_ want to go the party. There was even talk about just _not_ showing up, but that was more of a fantasy than a possibility, because there were two driving forces preventing that from happening:

  1. The assholes would just come to our dorm room and probably literally drag us out with them, and
  2. Call me insane, but I actually . . . _wanted_ to know who Kenny was dating.



Shut up, I’m not even fucking kidding when I say that Tweek had altered the whole ‘don’t give a fuck’ genotype in my genetic makeup.

Oh, see. Biology _was_ helping me.

I also just wanted to see the asshole quartet’s reaction to meeting Kenny’s boyfriend. It didn’t even matter who it was, it was bound to be fucking hysterical.

But, by the time it was five o’clock, Tweek and I had to face facts. We were going to go to our first, (and, if things went our way, our last), college party. And there were going to be eight people, (not including me), originally from South Park there. Well, nine, if you include Kenny’s boyfriend, who I assumed was from South Park, if the guys theoretically already knew who he was, despite not knowing who he actually was. And Tweek was just psycho enough to be considered a surrogate South Park citizen, so . . .

Damn. Thinking about it as Tweek and I were leaving our dorm room, I realized that something batshit crazy was going to happen, and I would be there to see it.

Hopefully a fist fight.

It was only about a seven minute walk. I knew exactly where to go. I had passed by that place a thousand times on my way to my history class. It wasn’t quite smack dab in the center of campus, but it was there enough for me to know about it. Tweek, on the other hand, was just following me after me like a puppy, and that fact was very obvious. Every time I turned, Tweek faltered and had to make up steps in order to turn with me.

As we neared the buffet parking lot, I saw the group of guys we were meeting already present, minus the girls, who I assumed were going to come at the same time. Kyle, Cartman, Stan, Clyde, and Token were just standing around, looking extremely bored as they waited, but Kenny had this huge grin on his face, and he was prattling on and on about something. Tweek and I couldn’t hear it from where we were standing, but his mouth was moving like it was on fire. Nobody was answering him, though that didn’t seem to bother Kenny, was gesturing wildly with his hands.

I sighed. “Tweek, this is going to be absolutely horrible.”

“GAH! Oh, Jesus, man!” Tweek said, gripping the front of his shirt and pulling mercilessly. “You’re not going to abandon me, are you?”

I frowned at him. “Dude, when have I ever abandoned you?”

The closer we were to the guys, the more anxious Tweek seemed to become. “NGH! Well, I don’t know, man! It’s just, you were friends with all these guys first, and I --”

“Tweek, these guys are assholes,” I said blankly. “I’m not leaving your side for a second tonight. You’re going to be sick of me by the time the party’s over.”

Tweek looked greatly relieved by this. “Oh . . . good . . .”

Clyde caught sight of us first, and he grinned broadly, waving with his entire arm. Jesus, he was like a child, but I guess I understood. Us finally showing up meant that Kenny would shut up, even for just a second, and that was good in _anybody’s_ book.

“Hey, guys!” he said when we joined the circle.

“Hi.”

“GAH!”

“I’m surprised you two showed up,” Stan said, looking over to us with a raised eyebrow. “I didn’t think you were going to.”

“Yeah, well,” I said, shrugging. “I didn’t want you guys to show up at our dorm room again.”

Clyde grinned. “I’m just telling you now, but we totally would’ve done that.”

I gave him a blank look. “I know you would’ve. That’s why we’re here right now.”

“Forget about that,” Kenny interrupted giddily. When I looked over at him, he had his hands together in front of his chest, his knees were bent slightly, and there was a massive grin on his face. “You guys get to meet my boyfriend today!”

The remaining three of the original asshole quartet exchanged glances. Tweek looked over at me with a raised eyebrow, but I just shrugged. I had no idea what the hell was going on, so I just silently stood next to Tweek, our arms brushing up against each others every once in awhile. It was comforting to have a person with me that didn’t give a shit about other people’s business, and was content to just stay on the sidelines. That was one of the reasons why I hated Stan and those guys so much when we were kids; they didn’t know when to just _shut the fuck up._

“You guys already know him,” Kenny continued. “You know him really well, actually. Even Craig’ll recognize him. He’s _amazing_! He’s sweet and innocent, but also sarcastic and a _dynamo_ in the sack . . .” I grimaced, sharing another look with Tweek. The grossed-out expression on his face told me all I needed to know: Kenny was too open about his relationship, despite us not even knowing who the other person was. “And even though he gives probably the best head in the universe, he’s still constantly unaware of any and all innuendos that happen around him. He doesn’t _get_ it. He’s the cutest little shit in the entire world, and I’m _so excited to see him again_ \--”

Suddenly, mid-sentence, Kenny shut up, his eyes locking on one spot on the other side of the parking lot, and this huge grin spread across his face. “He’s here, you guys! My boyfriend’s here!”

He sounded like a teenager girl. He was almost bouncing up and down. I recoiled at the sight.

Everybody turned towards where he was staring, but the only person in that general vicinity was . . . Butters.

 _Butters Stotch_.

He was just as awkward as I remembered him being; he clambered out of a beat-up old 2007 Volkswagen, his bright blonde hair, (the same color as Tweek’s), sticking straight up in tufts, and waved at the whole group with a goofy smile. Basically, the only thing that had changed about Butters since the last time I’d seen him was his size. He got taller, and I guess he kinda filled out a little bit, too, but his face was exactly the same, and even the way he called out, “Hiya, fellas!”, followed by him knocking his knuckles together was the spitting image of his ten-year-old self.

“Get out of the way, Butters!” Cartman called out, using his hands as a megaphone. “We’re trying to see Kenny’s imaginary boyfriend!”

“Shut up, Cartman,” Kenny said half-heartedly, his eyes fixed on Butters’ general direction.

There was a weird gleam in Kenny’s eyes as he looked at Butters, and . . . I don’t know . . . I had a funny feeling . . .

But no, no way, Kenny would never . . .

But if I didn’t know any better, I would’ve thought that --

Kenny hurried over to Butters, his face eager and ecstatic, and the entire parking complex fell completely silent as we all watched him do the unthinkable. Kenny had stopped right in front of Butters, and his hands had found their way to Butters’ waist and he was kissing him straight on the mouth. And Butters was kissing back.

Yep.

Butters Stotch and Kenny McCormick were . . . making out. In the middle of the all-you-can-eat buffet’s parking lot.

I was too in shock to say anything. (Not like anybody expected me to, anyway.) But, even if I had forgotten a lot of the people from South Park, (mostly because I just didn’t want to remember them), being reintroduced to them brought back all those repressed memories. I remembered how much of a pussy-pushover Butters was back in elementary school. He always followed Cartman around like a mouse on a string, always doing his bidding and believing Cartman’s bullshit theories and ravings. And then in middle school, he started hanging out with Jason and Kevin, and he stopped spending all his time with the asshole quartet. I didn’t really feel anything about Butters; him and I didn’t talk much, so I didn’t care either way.

But I always did find it weird how attached he was to Cartman, especially if Cartman was such a manipulative dick to him. I mean, Kyle could hold his own, but Butters . . . couldn’t. Maybe he had a torch for awhile . . . You never fucking know with South Park kids.

My musings were interrupted when Kenny and Butters returned to the group, hand-in-hand, wearing matching smiles. Kyle was the first one to speaking, saying, “No. Way,” in his slow, confused voice that he always used when he didn’t know what else to say. When he didn’t know how to assess a situation in that intelligent, analytical way he always did. What an asshole.

“You and . . . Butters?” Stan asked, adding his genius two cents in.

Kenny beamed proudly at the two of them, releasing Butters’ hand, and instead wrapping an arm around his boyfriend’s waist and rested their heads together. “Yep,” he said happily. “Me and Butters!”

Everybody went quiet. I caught Tweek’s eye, and he looked extremely confused. Clearly, he didn’t know either of them that well, and he didn’t understand why the couple was so . . . weird. I shrugged at him, before turning back to everybody else.

The moment was interrupted by Cartman’s obnoxious laughter. “No way, dude. Are you seriously?”

Kenny frowned. “Yeah. Butters and I have been together for almost a year. But he wasn’t out yet, ‘cause his parents are the biggest assholes in the world.” He glanced at Butters and added, with no sincerity, “No offense.”

Butters grinned, and said in his goofy, southern-twanged voice, “O-oh, that’s alright, Ken. I know they wouldn’t be too happy finding out I’m . . . well, you know.”

“Gay,” Kenny supplied.

Butters nodded, and let out a little breath. “Yeah, my dad would be awful sore i-if he found out I’m dating another boy.”

Kenny sighed, running a hand up down Butters’ upper arm. “You shouldn’t care about what they think. As long as you’re happy, they should be happy, too. And if they aren’t, then fuck them. You still have my family.”

Cartman snorted. “Kenny, I don’t think Butters is interested in eating pop tarts for dinner for the rest of his life.”

“H-hey, shut up, Eric,” Butters said with an unimpressed frown. “I-I don’t care about that. Besides, Kenny’s got a real good scholarship here, and h-he’ll be making lots of money! And even if he doesn’t . . .” He turned to look at Kenny with gooey eyes. “W-well, I’d just have to stick around with him, anyhow. Right, Kenny?”

Kenny grinned back, but there was something sadder in his smile. “That’s right, Buttercup.”

I grimaced. Ugh, I hated pet names.

Apparently I wasn’t the only one who thought so, because Tweek “GAH!”’d next to me, Cartman and Kyle had matching eye rolls, Token had an appropriately-Token apathetic expression, and Stan looked like he was about to throw up. Clyde on the other hand, ever the naive sap, had a curious smile on his face.

“Alright, how exactly did . . . _that_ happen?” Stan asked, staring at them with fixed, slightly nauseous attention.

A smirk instantly took over Kenny’s face, almost like he’d been waiting for someone to ask the question. Butters smiled shyly, his cheeks turning pink, and he glanced at his boyfriend. As if Kenny had felt Butters’ eyes, he looked over at the guy who belonged to the shoulders he had his arm around. Butters’ smile grew. “A-are we telling them _all_ of it?”

“We can tell them as much, or as little, as you want, Buttercup,” Kenny said, airily, craning his head down to place a kiss on his boyfriend’s cheek. My stomach churned at the sight. Couldn’t that wait until they were, like, _not_ around other people?

Butters turned bright red, and he laughed happily, leaning to rest his head on Kenny’s shoulder. “Y-you can tell it. I know how much you like to, and I-I’d just get embarrassed and mess it up.”

“No, we do it together,” Kenny said. “Besides, you’ve always got some interesting things to say about . . . certain parts of it.” He winked, and then laughed when Butters ducked his head sheepishly. “But how about we wait until dinner to tell it?” Kenny continued. “It’s a little awkward talking about this while standing around like this in a parking lot.”

“A-alright, then, Kenny!” Butters instantly agreed, nodding enthusiastically.

There was another beat of silence before Cartman interrupted it again with his obnoxious laughter. “I still can’t believe _Butters_ is the ‘sexy blonde’ that Kenny always talked about. Like . . . _Butters_? _Really_?”

Kenny frowned, his eyebrows furrowing in his anger. “I’m only going to say this once, fatass. Butters is my boyfriend, and if you mess with him, I will _end_ you.”

“Alright, fine,” Cartman said with a chuckle, raising his arms in mock surrender. “Calm your tits, you don’t have to defend his _honor_ , or whatever, against me --”

“Kyle, tighten the leash,” Kenny said firmly, turning his attention to the narrow-eyebrowed man standing beside Cartman.

“O-oh, please don’t fight,” Butters pleaded in his innocent, high-pitched voice. “It’s my first day back around you fellas for months now, and I-I don’t want no problems or nothing. I just want to hang out with my old pals.” He beamed, glancing around at everybody, and ignoring their varying looks of indifference, mild frustration, or anxiousness. (The last one being specifically in Tweek’s case.) “And I didn’t get to say it yet, but it’s nice to see you again, C-Craig!”

I raised an eyebrow at him, not having expected him to really remember me much. We hardly ever talked. “Um. Yeah, you, too, I guess.”

“It’s so nice to see _all_ of you again! A-and I can’t not be happy now!” Butters suddenly cheered. “I-I got my favorite guy in the whole wide world with me, and ‘cause, now that I’m 18, my parents can’t ground me for being gay!” he exclaimed happily.

“They would do that?” Tweek blurted out, for a moment forgetting the fact that Butters was a stranger, and the other guys had only heard his normal speaking voice a whopping total of three times now. I totally didn’t forget, and I actually felt . . . weirdly proud of him, even though he looked horrified at the idea of a parent grounding their child just for being themselves. Oh, if only he met the Stotch’s . . .

“Well, sure,” Butters said, as if it were obvious. Because, to him, it was so normal it was probably almost boring, and definitely annoying. Or at least some nuisance that he’d learned to live with over the years. “I get grounded all the time.”

“Butters got grounded once for being scared of a lightning storm,” Kenny said with a frown, which is super rare for Kenny, who is basically the poster boy for the sole emotion of content.

Tweek looked beside himself with second-hand anguish. “GAH! Oh, man! Your parents sound awful! They’re almost as bad as _mine_!”

“O-oh, really?” Butters asked, sounding genuinely interested, and not at all offended. “What’re your parents like?”

Tweek’s eyes widened in horror, as if he hadn’t expected to say that. “Parents? GAH! Who said parents? Oh, Jesus, not me! Craig!” He suddenly turned to me, his normal panicked expression amplified, and he pleaded with his eyes for me to . . . I don’t know, do something, I guess, but I had no idea what.

I stared at him for a few seconds, but he knocked shoulders with me, (as best he could, considering I was a whole foot taller than him), and dropped his gaze to a glare, so I pretended I knew what he was talking and said, “Oh! Yeah, _I_ didn’t say anything about parents. Why’re we talking about parents?”

“GAH! Right!” Tweek agreed, nodding wildly.

“Let’s talk about something else,” I said casually, returning the knocking of shoulders with Tweek, and then grabbing his elbow when I realized I almost pushed him over.

There was a beat of slightly awkward silence, before Cartman said slowly, “Oookaaay . . . I mean, like, I’m of the homosexual population, but what the hell just happened here was _way_ too faggy for me to follow...”

“W-wait, too . . . what?” Butters asked, his eyes crinkling in confusion.

Cartman smirked. “Oh, yeah, you didn’t hear? Craig’s a total fudgepacker now.”

I scowled. “I’m not a fudgepacker, Cartman!”

Butters completely ignored me. “O-oh, is this your boyfriend, then?” he asked, looking between Tweek and I curiously. “I was wondering why you two were standing so close together.”

I glanced over at Tweek, and realized that our shoulders were an inch apart, and that if I moved my hand the slightest bit, it would graze his hand, and just the thought of that made me blush, so I took a sidestep away. Tweek mirrored me. “Uh, no,” I said, shaking my head. “This is Tweek, and we’re not dating.”

Butters looked even more confused than he did before. “Really?” he asked, like he didn't believe me.

“If I had a boyfriend, I’m pretty sure I’d know about it,” I said, shooting a glare in Cartman’s direction. That whole part of the conversation was _his_ fault. “And I’m getting pretty sick of you guys bringing it up.”

“Well, we’re getting pretty sick of you two acting like you bone each other every night,” Clyde said, shrugging nonchalantly. “Now, before someone gets punched in the face, let’s go eat!”

“Shouldn’t we wait for the girls first?” Butters asked.

Clyde hummed, lifting his arms as if they were scales, and said, “Wait for the girls . . . eat food . . . What do you think I’m going to say?”

“W-well, it’s just that I haven’t seen them in a while, and I was actually p-pretty good friends with Bebe --”

“Wait,” Stan said suddenly, his posture straightening and his eyebrows quirking in concentration. “If Bebe’s coming . . . and she’s a part of the ‘girls’ . . . does that mean that . . . _Wendy’s_ gonna be here?”

“Yeah, dude,” Kyle said, as if the answer were obvious. “What part of ‘everybody’s coming’ didn’t you understand?”

“Apparently the ‘everybody’ part,” Cartman observed lazily, grabbing Kyle’s hand and starting to tug him in the direction of the restaurant. “Now, come _on_ , I’m hungry and I can smell the ribs from here.”

So, that day I learned that it’s really fucking easy to get a table set for eleven at an all-you-can-eat buffet. I was hoping it would take longer, so I could spend some time with Tweek, just off to the side, because once we were seated, everybody could’ve been looking at us.

As we were all finding seats, Clyde grabbed hold of Tweek’s arm, (a thing to know about me is that I give credit where credit is due, and, even though that move pissed me the fuck off, I could tell he wasn’t grabbing him _too_ hard),  and said to me, as an explanation, “I wanna get to know Tweek some more.” Then, turning to Tweek, he said, “You wanna sit by me and Token?”

Tweek “GAH!”’d, and twisted his arm, struggling to get out of Clyde’s grasp, and looked up at me for help. I was more than okay with grabbing hold of Clyde’s wrist and squeezing until he yelped and pulled away. I rolled my eyes at the glare he sent me.

“I think, for the sake of your safety and my sanity, you should just let Tweek sit by me.”

“How come you always get to hang out with Tweek?” he whined, folding his arms over his chest. “What if I want to hang out with him, without your giant body looming over us?”

I shrugged. “To answer your question, Tweek’s my best friend, and I don’t want you corrupting him.”

“What if he _wants_ to be corrupted?” Kenny asked cheekily, taking a break from ogling his boyfriend to butt into the conversation.

I rolled my eyes again. Were they that fucking stupid? “Well, since I spend pretty much all my time with Tweek, I can tell you that he doesn’t.” And then, because I knew those assholes wouldn’t trust my word, I turned to Tweek and asked, “Would you want to hang out with Clyde?”

Tweek hesitated, biting his lip, and glanced up at me with his big hazel eyes. “GAH! NGH! Well . . . I mean, he's -- NGH! -- he’s not as bad as Cartman . . .”

Cartman “Eh!”’d, which he always did whenever someone insulted him, but Clyde cheered like a child, exclaiming, “Not as bad as Cartman! I’ll take it!”

I felt Tweek tug on my coat sleeve, and, when I glanced down at him, he was staring worriedly at the group of guys, who were just staring back, waiting for something interesting to happen. I raised an eyebrow at Tweek when his gaze flicked to me, and he “GAH!”’d, before saying to me, as quietly as I knew he was capable,

“Sidebar?”

I tilted my head at that, but complied nonetheless, following Tweek as he tugged me in the direction of the bathroom.

“What’s up, Tweek?” I asked as the doors closed behind the both of us.

Tweek pulled on his shirt front, (it was fucking freezing outside, I remember thinking; I should get him a coat or something), before taking a deep breath, and saying, “NGH! Is Clyde really that bad?”

I paused, contemplating how to answer that. Theoretically, no, he wasn’t all that bad. He was completely harmless, a softie, almost a wet blanket, but not quite. He had more of a back bone than I gave him credit for, but he was still a little weakling. I shrugged, and told Tweek as much.

“Well . . . can I sit next to him?”

I raised an eyebrow again. “Why are you asking permission?”

“GAH!” Tweek pulled even harsher at his shirt front. “I don’t want to make you mad --”

I was a little taken aback by that. “Tweek, I’m not gonna stop you from having friends. Clyde really isn’t all that bad of a dude. He doesn’t know when to shut up, he’s emotionally sensitive, and he thinks he’s funny, but other than that, he’s not going to _do_ anything to you. He might tease you, or whatever, but nothing worse than what he’s already done. He’s nowhere _near_ as bad as Cartman.”

Tweek let out a deep breath. “Oh . . . good.”

He looked . . . a little too relieved for my taste, and I started squirming uncomfortably. “But . . . I mean, you’re still going to sit next to _me_ , right?”

Tweek looked up, and I guess something in my expression amused him, because he grinned at me. “Of course I’m going to sit next to you. If you’re not gonna leave my side, then I’m not gonna leave yours, either.” He paused thoughtfully. “So don’t worry. I won’t ditch you for Clyde.”

“Shut up, I wasn’t worried,” I mumbled, averting my eyes. I wasn’t exactly embarrassed, but . . . I don’t know, I didn’t want him to know I was worried about him suddenly abandoning me to make friends with other people. That sounds totally fucking selfish, but I guess I got . . . a little _attached_ to him.

Tweek did his little giggle-laugh, and said, “Whatever you say, Craig. We should go back now.”

It was unspoken, but I knew exactly what he was thinking: _Or else they’ll think we’re participating in the horizontal mambo_.

When Tweek and I returned to the group, they were all sitting around the table, but the girls had yet to show up. I guess that they all decided to at least wait for them to get food, which was unusually kind of them.

There were two empty spots nearest the bathroom, with Clyde and Token bordering the vacancies. They were clearly left for Tweek and I, so I turned to him and asked, “Which one do you want, Token or Clyde?”

“GAH! NGH! Well, Clyde asked, so I guess . . .”

Hmm. Interesting choice, I remember thinking. Not the one I would’ve made, but Tweek and I varied so much that I wasn’t surprised.

We took our respective seats, and Clyde immediately flung an arm around Tweek’s shoulders. Tweek instantly recoiled, leaning into me to try to escape Clyde’s clutches, and I caught him before he fell off his seat.

“Tweek, why don’t we hang out?” Clyde asked, pulling away when he realized that he was freaking Tweek out.

“Because you’re an asshole,” I answered for him.

Clyde raised an eyebrow at me, but he didn’t seem too offended. I didn’t know if that was a good thing or a bad thing. “You’re an asshole, too, so your point is invalid.”

I shrugged. “Yeah, but he’s used to me. And you and I are different kinds of assholes.”

“Right, Craig’s the gay kind, and Clyde’s the manwhore kind,” Cartman inserted obnoxiously.

I decided to just ignore that fat fuck for the time being. “I don’t make fun of him nearly as often as you would.”

“GAH! NGH! You make fun of me all the time!” Tweek said in a shrill voice. He didn’t punch me, though, so he couldn’t have been too upset.

I shrugged again. “You make it easy.”

Before anybody could answer, the voices of Wendy and Bebe interrupted the conversation.

“Hey, guys!” Bebe called, plopping into a seat next to Butters. “Thanks for waiting.”

Butters lit up at the sight of Bebe, and he flung his arms around her. “Bebe!” he exclaimed happily. “Aw, I sure missed you!”

Bebe laughed and hugged him back. “I missed you, too, Buttercup.”

I tilted my head curiously. They were an . . . odd pairing. Almost as strange as Butters and Kenny. Maybe Butters just attracted people from all walks of life. He seemed to be a magnet for every freak he came across, so it made since that such a varied group of people would want to be friends, or more than friends with him. But nobody batted an eye at the hugging blondes, so I just assumed that that was how they normally interacted. Definitely wasn’t normal for me, though.

Wendy didn’t seem as happy as Bebe to be at the restaurant, because the only seat left was next to . . .

Fucking _Stan_.

Jesus fucking Christ, the universe could be a bitch sometimes.

She sat down hesitantly, offering him a shy, sad glance. He gave her the same look, but they immediately averted their gazes.

Wendy cleared her throat. “Hello, Stan.”

Stan nodded at the polished wooden table. “Wendy.”

“How have you been?”

“Fine.”

“That’s good.”

I cringed at the extremely awkward conversation, and decided it was much too cringey to keep eavesdropping.

“Can we get food now?” Clyde asked, pretty much bouncing up and down in his seat in his stupid, childish excitement. I imagined an all-you-can-eat buffet was heaven for him _and_ Cartman, who seemed to be in the same state as Clyde.

“Yes, please, thank God,” Stan gasped, rising to his feet instantly. I didn’t blame him, for once.

Okay, so, the first I thought when I got in line, was that there was a _lot_ of fucking food there. More food than I’d ever seen in my entire life. That one restaurant could’ve fed all of Africa, including the animals as well as the people. I wasn’t all that hungry, so I just took a helping of mashed potatoes, some applesauce, a piece of bread, and a scoop of spaghetti. Enough to hold me over.

I glanced behind me at Tweek’s plate to make sure he was getting enough, and I was surprised that it was just . . . empty. He didn’t put fucking anything on it. He was hugging it to his chest, his gaze flicking at all his surroundings nervously. I guess he felt my eye son him, because he looked at me for a few seconds before saying,

“GAH! NGH! Do you think there’s coffee here?”

I rolled my eyes. “Yes, there’s coffee in the corner over there. Buuut,” I added, grabbing hold of his wrist before he could walk away. “You need real, actual _food_.”

“But I’m not -- NGH! -- hungry, so I’ll just --”

“I don’t care if you’re hungry or not, you’re going to eat.”

“But Craig --”

“At least have some mashed potatoes, they look really good --”

“I’m not --”

I raised my arms up, which instantly shut him up. “Hand me your plate, and go get some coffee. Meet back at the table?” I added this last sentence because he looked absolutely terrified at the prospect of parting ways. He seemed slightly relieved by the fact that my demand sounded more like a mission suggestion, and he nodded, giving me his porcelain plate with a shaking hand. “Mugs should be next to it. And while you’re over there, can you get me some water please?”

“GAH! NGH! Okay.”

Instead of just grabbing Tweek mashed potatoes and nothing else, I got just the same of everything I got, and carried both plates in the direction of the table.

That moment gave me a renewed appreciation of waiters, something that I already had, from watching them bustle this way and that since I was a kid.

It took about ten minutes before I was back at the table, but it would’ve taken a lot less time if I wasn’t stuck behind _Cartman_. At least Clyde was too distracted by the dessert table to get an actual meal; I would have never had time to eat in an actual chair if I got stuck behind the biggest fatasses in the universe.

Tweek was just a few seconds behind me, clutching a mug of steaming coffee in one hand, (never would I ever understand how the heat didn’t burn him), and a glass filled to the top with water in the other. I took the glass before he could spill it all over the place, thanked him, and showed him the plentiful amount of food I had gathered for him.

He rolled his eyes, but mumbled a “GAH! Thank you,” back.

After everybody had been eating for a few minutes, sharing mild, insignificant chatter, Kenny clinked a fork to his glass of chocolate milk, getting everybody’s attention before announcing, “Alright, are we all ready to hear the story of the time Butters seduced me like the sexy temptress that he is?”

There were faint murmurs of agreement from everybody at the table, but the asshole quartet instantly perked up at the prospect of hearing Kenny’s explanation. I’m sure they were all very curious. I gotta admit, I was a little curious myself.

“I’m glad everybody was able to make it to dinner,” Kenny continued casually, and I saw him glance at Tweek with a wink. “I wanted _everybody_ here when I told the story of me and Butters’ whirlwind romance.”

Tweek seemed to catch onto the fact that Kenny was talking at least partially to him, because his face got all confused, and he asked, “GAH! Why?”

I didn’t like how Tweek and Kenny were looking at each other. Just . . . just fucking _looking_ at each other. It drove me fucking insane, so I interjected myself into their conversation. “Yeah, why?”  

“Because I think it’s a story that the entire fucking world needs to hear,” Kenny said with a shrug. “Specifically, you two.” He nodded at me, and I raised an eyebrow.

“Who two?” I asked.

“You and Tweek,” he answered, as if it were obvious.

I was completely caught off guard. Why Tweek and I specifically needed to hear the story of two gay guys, (who’d known each other for fifteen years), getting together was beyond me. “Why?” I asked flatly.

He shrugged again. “It might put things into perspective.” Before Tweek or I could respond to that properly, (Tweek managed to squeeze in a, “GAH!” but nothing else), Kenny took a breath and began the story.  

“I honestly didn’t think I was gay up until I was seventeen. I mean, I had doubts every once in awhile, but nothing major. I don’t know if you guys even remember it, because after a while, I could tell you just started ignoring me, but I would talk about tits and vaginas all the fucking time.”

Everybody, including me but excluding Tweek, groaned at the same time. I _definitely_ remember that. As far back as third grade, half of Kenny’s comments on any given situation had to do with various parts of the female body. It was totally excessive, and, now that I think about it, probably had to do with his subconscious repressing all his homo, dick-loving thoughts.

“But, even though I had you believe I’d fucked the entire female population at South Park High, I had only had sex twice, and they were both one-nights stands, _and_ I was way too fucking drunk to remember who they were. I mean, I _was_ horny all the time, I just didn’t always act on it.” He paused a moment, smirking. “I mean, I acted on it, just not with another person.”

I grimaced. He had no shame.

“It happened at Bebe’s Fourth of July party when we were juniors. The party itself sucked balls, no offense.” Bebe didn’t look at all offended. She just tilted her head and shrugged in response. “I had the decency to wait until it was at least dark outside to start drinking, and I was drinking hard. I could, and can, handle my alcohol like a pro.

“I was just sitting on the sidelines of the party, like I always did, and watched everybody grinding in Bebe’s living room, and making out in the corner, and I even saw Wendy slap Stan in the face.” He chuckled, and, when I glanced over at Wendy and Stan, who were sitting very close, they didn’t react, so it must not have been that big of an issue. “I can’t remember why she did that, but I do remember it was funny as hell.

“It was right around that time that Butters walked up to me and patted me on the shoulder. I had kinda been keeping an eye on him. It didn’t even matter what he does, or who he’s with, Butters always manages to get into some kind of trouble, and he had been drinking, too, so the risk of him getting arrested, or lost, or kidnapped was way too fucking high for me to just not watch him. He just kinda looked at me for a few seconds, before he said, his voice slurred because he’d just knocked back three shots of patrone and a few beers, ‘I got some apples, Ken, do you got some, too?’” Kenny paused a moment to let out a few chuckles before continuing. “I had no idea what the fuck he was talking about, so I told him no, and then he got all sad looking, and said, ‘Oh. Well, if you did, we could make some applesauce.’ And I _still_ had no idea what the fuck he was talking about, but I was also drunk off my ass, so, instead of asking _why_ he was asking to make applesauce with me, I informed him that I didn’t _know_ how to make applesauce. And he said, and I _fucking_ quote, ‘It’s real easy, Ken. We just take off our clothes and rub against each other for a while until our wieners get real hard, and then we go faster and faster until they’re soft again.’ I swear to fucking God, if I wasn’t so shocked I would’ve been on the _floor_ laughing.”

Butters let out a noise of embarrassment, and dropped his burning face into his hands. “Th-that was _not_ how I planned on confessing. It was supposed to be _way_ more romantic than _that_.”

Kenny laughed, wrapping an arm around Butters’ shoulders. “No way, dude. That was probably the best moment of my entire life, you adorable asshole. I wouldn’t trade it for anything.”

“So, what happened after that?” Cartman said through a mouthful of ribs. “Did you guys just fuck and decide you were gonna be the weirdest couple in the universe?”

“I think you’ll find that you and Kyle are the weirdest couple in the universe,” Clyde interrupted, and was consequently ignored by everyone.

“W-well,” Butters said thoughtfully, resting his elbows on the table and putting his chin in his palms. “It didn’t happen _right_ off.”

Kenny sighed, and the majority of his happiness slipped away. “Yeah. I did something that . . .” he groaned, “that I regret more than anything I’ve ever done in my entire life.”

“What did you do?” Bebe asked, and, when I looked over at her, I saw that she was actually very wrapped up in the story. I guess her and Butters really did become pretty good friends because she was probably just as interested as the asshole quartet.

Kenny caught her eye and said, “I . . . cheated on him. With you.”

Alright, if everybody wasn’t paying attention already, they just honed into the conversation at that. Cartman even put his ribs down and said, “Oooh, and the plot thickens.”

Bebe looked extremely confused. “With . . . me? Are you talking about --”

“About the time you dragged me into the girls bathroom and started making out with me? Yes.”

“Oh my God!” she exclaimed, her face somehow expressing both happiness and distress. “You had a boyfriend then?”

Kenny and Butters exchanged a look. “Not exactly,” Butters said carefully. “Ol’ Ken and I weren’t . . . we didn’t agree on anything or nothing.”

“I thought we were friends with benefits, to be honest,” Kenny said, shifting closer to Butters absentmindedly. “I was a fucking dumbass and didn’t really realize that Butters is the greatest human being ever.”

Butters blushed. “O-oh, stop it, Ken,” he said bashfully. “Y-you know that’s not true.”

Kenny rolled his eyes fondly, pulling Butters close to him and kissing his cheek. “Don’t make me tell you this all over again. You know where it always leads to.”

Butters cheeks went from pink to scarlet and he giggled shyly. “Y-yeah . . .”

Bebe beamed happily. Jesus, she changed a lot since I last saw her when we were teenagers. She was . . . girlier, if that makes any fucking sense at all. She was excitable. She used to be calmer, more sly about the things that made her happy. “So, what happened after that?”

Kenny burst into laughter, leaning away and covering his mouth with his forearm. He was so loud that people from neighboring tables shot him irritated, curious, or amused looks. He took a few gasping breaths before managing out, “Jesus fucking Christ . . .”

Butters sighed softly, rolling his eyes. “I-it’s not _that_ funny, Ken.”

“No, you’re right, sweetheart, it’s not funny,” Kenny said taking one last breath before grinning at Butters with softened eyes. “It’s fucking _hilarious_. Guys, have you ever seen Butters mad before? Like really, _really_ mad?”

I thought back. I remembered when he went full pro-men, down-women when we were in fourth grade, but he wasn’t really mad. He turned into a twisted SJW -- irrational and easily set off, but I wouldn’t label that as _mad_. Everybody else exchanged glances, before shaking their heads.

“Well, he’s a spit fire, I’ll tell you that,” Kenny said, rolling his eyes. “And he’s got a _mean_ left hook.”

Cartman choke on his ribs, and, when he recovered enough to speak, he exclaimed loudly, “Holy shit, no way! Dude, fucking _Butters_ punched you?!”

Kenny nodded. “Oh, yeah. Broke my nose, too.”

The asshole quartet looked at each other blankly, which was something I didn’t understand, until Stan looked back at Kenny with a raised eyebrow, and said, “So . . . you lied. You _didn’t_ break your nose in a fishing accident?”

Kenny scoffed. “When was the last time you’ve seen me fish?”

That shut Kyle, Stan, and Cartman up pretty fucking fast.

I guess Kenny took that opportunity to continue. “So, Butters yelled at me, called me a lot of swear words that I didn’t think he knew existed, punched me in the face, and then wouldn’t talk to me for a week. A whole fucking week. That gave me plenty of time to think about how fucking stupid I was. It took another week to get him to forgive me, lots of cornering him after classes and randomly showing up at his house when I knew he was home. I spent probably almost . . . yeah, a good $100 on flowers, stuffed animals, chocolates, the whole thing. It wasn’t until I got on one knee on his doorstep, told him I was in love with him, and fucking begged for mercy, that he actually forgave me. And . . . here we are.” He smiled at Butters, wrapping an arm around his shoulders and rested their heads together.

Butters leaned into him with the most Butters smile I’d ever seen. “H-here we are.”

Bebe squealed happily, resting her chin in her palm. “Oh, that’s so sweet! Butters, you’re the luckiest guy in the world!”

“Aw, shucks,” Butters said bashfully, looking at his plate with a smile. “Th-that’s awful nice of ya, Bebe. But I know. Ol’ Ken’s just the best in the whole world.”

“Okay, is the story over?” I asked, hiding my frown behind my glass of water. I was definitely not one for romance, and I had no idea why Kenny thought I needed to hear all about his adventure into gayhood.

“D-don’t be such a grouch, C-Craig,” Butters scolded.

“Yeah, just ‘cause Tweek hasn’t put out yet, doesn’t mean you can belittle other people’s happiness,” Cartman said nonchalantly. I couldn’t take his ‘insult’ seriously, though, with his face all covered with barbecue sauce.

“GAH! NGH! Oh, man, when will it stop?!” Tweek exclaimed loudly, burying his face into his arms. For a second, I was worried he started fucking crying, but his trembling wasn’t any more pronounced than usual, so I figured he was just hiding his face from any onlookers. He was pretty red before.

“Yeah, what Tweek said,” I echoed. It was moments like that that I loved my monotone voice.

“It’ll stop when you admit you two have the hots for each other,” Kenny said, raising his chocolate milk to his lips.

“Guys, you’re really making Tweek nervous,” Wendy interjected with a frown. “You’ve been on their case since you met them, can’t you just give it a rest already?”

Kenny observed Tweek and I thoughtfully before shrugging and nodding. “Fine, yeah, whatever. Today’s all about me and my Buttercup, anyway.”

* * *

We finally left the restaurant at about 6:45, and it was getting pretty fucking dark outside. The sky was just a darker blue, and you could still see, but night was very quickly approaching. There was chatter about heading over the party, (which supposedly started at 7), when Butters suddenly put a hand on Tweek’s upper arm.

“Tweek, i-it’s awful chilly outside.” Trying not to draw attention to it, Tweek slid his arm away, but, because Butters was probably the most naive person on the planet, he didn’t notice, and just said, “Don’t you have a coat?”

Tweek shook his head. “GAH! No.”

Everybody waited for an explanation, but I knew they weren’t going to get one.

“I think I have an extra in my car,” Butters said offhandedly, quirking his mouth in thought. “D-do you wanna borrow it?”

Tweek looked up at me, as if asking for my permission, (I huffed inwardly; I needed to have a talk with him about him not being some object that I owned), so I just shrugged to show that it was his decision. I highly recommended it, because Tweek really did need to learn to wear some fucking clothes, but he needed to make that choice on his own.

Looking down at his feet, and holding his arms over his stomach, Tweek nodded slowly. “GAH! Well . . . okay . . .”

Butters beamed at him. He really was too nice for his own good. It was a good thing he had Kenny looking out for him; it would be all too easy to take advantage of someone as instantly trusting as Butters. “Alright! I-I’ll be right back!”

As he hurried away, Kenny turned to us and smiled wide. “Isn’t he a sweetheart?”

I shrugged, because I didn’t really care, and Tweek, “GAH!”’d, probably because he didn’t know what to say.

“Well, I think he is,” Kenny continued, staring at Butters’ car, and at the lower half of Butters’ body that was protruding from the backseat. “I wasted a lot of time. I could’ve been with Butters for way longer than a year, and if I just realized all of this sooner, all of my problems, you know, being lonely and left out all the time, could’ve been avoided.” Kenny turned back to us, and there was some emotion in his eyes, but I couldn’t tell what it was. It was really serious, though, so I decided to not be an asshole and wait for him to speak before I stopped caring. “Butters is the best thing that ever happened to me. I had so many opportunities before senior year to realize this, like the time Butters and I went to Hawaii together, and the time in middle school that Butters and I were raising that flower baby together. Thinking back on it now, I know how fucking stupid I was.” His gaze was _penetrating_ , shifting between Tweek and I, and I started squirming under it. “Don’t make the same mistake.”

I glanced at Tweek, just to see if he was as lost as I was. He was: his eyebrows were quirked together, his mouth screwed off to the side, and he was staring at his feet.

I cleared my throat, and looked back at Kenny. “I have no idea what the fuck you’re talking about, but if it makes you feel better, I won’t.”

Kenny stared at me for a second, before sighing and shrugging. “Okay.”

Because it seemed like everybody from South Park had the best timing ever, Butters came hurrying back, empty-handed. He offered Tweek a kind, apologetic smile and said, “I’m real sorry, Tweek, I forgot I gave it to the homeless guy I met at that gas station earlier today.”

“GAH! NGH! That’s okay, I’m fine --”

“No, Butters is right,” I interrupted suddenly. Tweek looked up at me, still slightly confused, so I said, “You’re going to freeze to death. You need your own coat, but for now, I’ll take you back to our dorm room and you can borrow one of my sweatshirts.”

Tweek’s cheeks turned a light pink and he gripped the front of his shirt nervously. “GAH! But, Craig --”

“This is something I should’ve done awhile ago,” I continued, folding my arms over my chest, and I turned to Kenny, who was watching us with almost _sad_ eyes. “Tweek and I will just go back to our dorm room to get a sweatshirt for him.”

“But you’ll be back, right?” I heard Clyde call from across the parking lot. Jesus, he had ultra hearing, how the fuck did he know what we were talking about?

“Yes, we’ll be back,” I said, rolling my eyes.

I felt a tugging on my coat sleeve again, and looked at Tweek, who was glaring at me. “GAH! NGH! Don’t I have a say?”

I raised an eyebrow. “Normally, yes. But if you get sick, _I’m_ going to be the one dealing with you, so, under these circumstances, no, you don’t have a say.”

Tweek folded his arms over his chest childishly, and averted his eyes. “GAH! You keep acting like you're my mom or something . . .”

I rolled my eyes at him, gripping his shoulder and turning him away from everyone else. As we walked to our dorm room, I said, “Well, I'm not your mother, but I am your best friend, and you’re already bruised to hell and back, I don’t need you getting a cold on top of that.”

Tweek blushed again, but didn’t say anything, so I added,

“Now . . . quit complaining. You should try to have at least _some_ fun tonight.”

He huffed. “Only if you do.”

* * *

Like I expected, Tweek chose the only green sweatshirt I had. I brought it with me only as a backup in case I was too lazy to do laundry, or I totally destroyed all my other ones. Looks like that was a good move, because it didn’t seem like Tweek would’ve worn any of my blue ones. Any of my _five_ blue sweatshirts. The only article of clothing that matters.

By the time Tweek and I found the frat house, it was pitch black outside. There were strobe lights and loud “music” that you could see and hear all the way from the beginning of the block, and I was instantly turned off. But, I didn’t want Clyde on my ass, so I continued to walk towards what I assumed was going to be the worst night of my entire life.

The inside of the party wasn’t much better. There was pounding, obnoxious, bass-filled music blaring through the speakers. Even parties back in _South Park_ were better than that. You’d get a few drunken fist fights, maybe some cheaters being exposed, and there was always that one kid who got on a table and started dancing, but at that party, (a real life, actual college party), all it was was drunk people grinding on each other. I mean, sure, people grinded on each other at the other parties I’d gone to before I left for Middle Town, but I’m not exaggerating when I say that every single fucking person was bumper to bumper with another person. It was on that thin line between party and orgy.

I looked at Tweek, who looked absolutely petrified. I guess he felt my eyes on him, because his head whipped to face me, and he clung onto my arm tightly. He raised himself up on his toes and shouted in my ear,

“GAH! NGH! Can we leave?”

I immediately nodded when he moved far enough away to see it. We had went to dinner, heard the story of Kenny and Butters, and made a quick appearance at the party. I figured, it was a good time to leave. We had fulfilled our duties. So, fuck them, Tweek and I were leaving.

The door was in sight, but, before we could even touch the door knob, Kenny appeared out of nowhere, raised a beer in our direction and smiling drunkenly. “Hey, where’re you guys going?”

“Tweek and I are going back to our dorm room,” I said blankly.

He shook his head, grabbing onto Tweek’s wrist and tugged him back into the frat house. “No way,” he shouted over his shoulder, as the music was getting louder and louder the deeper into the mess we got. “The actual, _real_ party’s in the basement.”

My brain processed what he said, but I was focusing a bit too much on the fact that . . . Kenny was clutching Tweek’s wrist. And Tweek . . . wasn’t pulling away. Tweek _always_ pulled away from everybody who wasn’t me. The thought that maybe I was losing touch when it came to Tweek irked me immensely, and I narrowed my eyes at the point of contact, as if the very image mortally offended me.

Kenny closed the basement door behind Tweek and I, and I instantly noticed that the basement was much better than the rest of the party. You could still hear the distant pounding of the bass from the large speakers on the main floor of the frat house, but it was much more bearable. There were actual lights on, and nobody was screaming at the top of their lungs.

It was good. If all college parties were that boring, I’d be a regular at every single one.

Ha. Totally just fucking lied.

Kenny marched immediately over to Butters, who was sitting on a couch with Clyde and Token, talking about something or other, I don’t know. I wasn’t really paying attention, until Kenny pushed Clyde to the side so that he could sit next to his boyfriend. Clyde, however, had been in the middle of braiding Bebe’s hair, so, when Clyde was suddenly shoved, he not only completely fell off the couch, but he yanked Bebe’s half-braided hair, too. Kenny, after realizing this fact, just shrugged and wrapped an arm around Butters’ shoulder.

On the other couch were Stan and Wendy, and they were sitting next to each other. Sitting right fucking next to each other, so close their thighs were touching. I rolled my eyes. So, apparently they had gotten back together since I had seen them at _dinner_. Which was like, maybe half an hour tops. I didn’t really feel the need to dwell on them. I was already finished trying to follow their relationship, and had long since resorted to ignoring their existence more than I had been before.

And then next to Stan and Wendy, there was Cartman and Kyle, and they were . . . certainly the sight to behold. Kyle was sitting in Cartman’s lap, an arm flung around Cartman’s neck, and they both looked a somewhat drunk, (not quite pass-out, but enough to loosen them up), with watery eyes and crooked, easy-going smiles. “Sing it again!” Kyle exclaimed loudly, raising his beer can in the air in celebration.

The entire room shouted, “ _No_!” at the same time, but Cartman beamed at Kyle, and began to sing, his voice squeaky, (it always was squeaky when he sang, I’d noticed that when we were kids), and his words slightly slurred,

“I swear! By the moon and the stars in the sky! I’ll be there!” The song sounded familiar, but I couldn’t quite place what it was, or where I even heard it to begin with. “And I swear! Like the shadow that’s by your side --” Cartman laid his face in the crook of Kyle’s neck, nuzzling him affectionately, and Kyle laughed happily. “--I swear, I’ll be there, Kahl!”

“For better or worse --” Kyle chimed in, a wide smile spread clear across his face.

“Till death do us paaaart!” Cartman continued obnoxiously, and he lifted his head, and they smirked at each other.

“I’ll love you with every gay beat of my heart!” they sang together, voices practically shouts, and they put their heads together, eyes closed and bright smiles on their faces. I scrunched my nose at the sight. Maybe they just did weirdly romantic shit when they were drunk, because I don’t even know if sober Kyle would allow Cartman to sing that song by himself, let alone join in with him.

“And I _suh-wear_!” Cartman half-sang, half-yelled, followed by this Mariah Carey bridge thing, where her voice jumps through notes really fast, only Cartman completely botched it, and it sounded like a dying cat. It made Kyle laugh, though, and, judging by the wide, almost childish grin on Cartman’s face as he stared at his boyfriend, that might’ve been the only reason he did that to begin with. (Well, that, and to piss off the entire room, so, either way, sounding like the worst singer in the world was a win-win for him.)

I turned to Butters, who looked the most sober out of all of them, and was probably the most reliable. “Uh . . . are they always like that when they’re drunk?” I asked, gesturing with my head in the dynamic duo’s direction.

“Y-yeah, they can get awful mushy,” Butters agreed, nodding.

“It’s fucking gross,” Clyde tacked on, cracking open a beer. “They do this every time they get drunk together. They belt “I Swear” at the top of their lungs. Every fucking time, without fail. And they’ll keep going, over and over until someone makes them stop.”

Kenny chuckled. “The morning after is _hilarious_ , because Kyle _always_ asks us if he sang ‘his and Cartman’s song’, and you should _see_ the look on his face when we say yes.”

“I may wanna vomit my brains out now because of them,” Stan added seriously, “But it’s almost worth it. Kyle looks so fucking mortified, and his face gets all red. It’s pretty funny.”

“Yet they both get drunk at _every_ party,” Token said, rolling his eyes. I don’t say it enough, but I actually really admired Token, if only because he could see right through bullshit, just like me.

It made me wonder, yet again, why I was best friends with _Clyde_ , for twelve fucking years.

“You guys want a beer?” Stan asked, gesturing to the cooler on the floor beside him. It was one of the smaller sized coolers, but it was packed to the fucking max, with brands from Coors, to Pabst Blue Ribbon, to Guinness. It was quite the assortment, and I immediately decided that, yes, I really _did_ want a beer.

I really, _really_ wanted a beer.

I raised a hand up, gesturing for Stan to throw me one, and said, “I’ll have one. Coors.” Because I was actually pretty coordinated for my size and build, I caught the beer with one hand, and cracked it open.

“GAH!” Tweek exclaimed, and, when I looked at him, he had a shaky arm raised, too. “Me, too.”

Yep, I was not fucking expecting that. Tweek was just full of surprises that day.

“Are you sure?” I asked him, raising an eyebrow when he turned to look at me.

Tweek frowned, and nodded determinedly. “NGH! Yes, I’m sure! I can drink, too, you know!”

“Dude, one sip, and you’re going to be down for the count, guaranteed,” I observed thoughtfully, and I totally expected to be punched on the arm, but I just didn’t care enough to move out of the way. “I’m sorry, Tweek, but you’re tiny.”

Tweek folded his arms over his chest and glared at me. “Well, yeah, but I can still drink!”

I smiled to myself, looking down at my beer can and shrugged. “Go for it. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Stan grinned, and asked Tweek, “What’s your poison?”

Tweek shook his head wildly and said, “Surprise me.”

“Oh, boy . . .” I mumbled, already foreseeing having to deal with a drunk Tweek.

Tweek just ignored me, and raised both hands as a Coors came flying in his direction. I could tell from my angle that there was no fucking way Tweek was going to catch that, so I reached a hand out, barely in time to prevent it from colliding with his already-bruised face. Tweek yelped, covering his face with his arms at the last second, not noticing that I had already saved him from earning another gross bruise on his other cheekbone.

I turned a glare to Stan, who didn’t seem at all affected by the fact that he pretty much just threw a can of beer at Tweek’s face. “Dude, what the hell?”

Stan shrugged. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to throw it that high.”

“Nice reflexes, dude,” Token said, nodding at me.

I barely acknowledged him, not because I didn’t appreciate the comment from the only sane person in the room, but because I heard Tweek gasp, and felt him pry the beer from my hand. “Craig! NGH! What the hell?”

I raised an unimpressed eyebrow at him. “Sorry for saving your face?”

He shook his head so fast it looked like his neck was going to snap right off. “Oh, man, that’s not what I mean! I didn’t know you were a _ninja_!”

My raised eyebrow just deepened. “I’m . . . not?”

“GAH! Yes, you are! Only ninjas can do _that_!”

“Craig’s not cool enough to be a ninja,” Cartman cut in, his voice slightly slurred, and a drunken smirk on his face. “He is faggy enough, though.”

I ignored him, instead saying to Tweek, “Being a boxer means having fast reflexes, Tweek. Besides, ninjas are lame. Boxers are cool.”

“I prefer briefs myself,” Clyde said absently, setting his beer aside and resuming his braiding of Bebe’s hair.

The room fell silent.

Surprisingly, _Wendy_ was the one to break the silence. She had been . . . unusually quiet the entire night, but she seemed more lively in that moment. “So, Tweek.”

Tweek jolted, and managed out only a loud, “GAH!”

“I don’t know much about you,” she went on, as if she didn’t notice the fact that he seemed nervous that she was talking to him. From the stories he’d heard from everybody, I’m not quite sure what he thought of her, but I could pretty confidently tell you that he wasn’t too fond of her. “We don’t really spend time together.”

“Tweek doesn’t spend time with _anybody_ ,” Clyde said, rolling his eyes. “Except Craig.”

“Craig doesn’t count,” Kenny interjected.

I rolled my eyes, but couldn’t really find anything wrong with the statement, so I stayed silent.

“Well, tell me a little about yourself,” Wendy said casually, shifting closer to Stan and resting her head on his shoulder. Stan wrapped an arm around her, a small smile lighting up his face. “Where are you from?”

“GAH! NGH! Denver . . .”

There was an awkward pause, in which I guess Wendy thought Tweek was going to elaborate on _where he was from_ , but, when he didn’t say anything, she continued. “What do you like to do?”

“EHH! Drink coffee, and watch Red Racer . . .” I guess Tweek was too comfortable talking around them for too long, because he started fidgeting, and tried to open his beer with his trembling fingers. But, like I’m sure you’re expecting, he couldn’t get his forefinger under the tab, and, after watching him, (extremely amused), for a few seconds, I relented, and took the can from him. I cracked it open, and handed it back to him, reveling in the brief smile he shot in my direction.

Wendy raised an eyebrow at him. “Is that it?”

Tweek took a long drink from the beer, making a disgusted face when it went down his throat. Guess it was his first time drinking, I remember thinking, amused. “GAH! What more do you want from me?” he choked out.

Wendy shrugged. “Did you play any sports in Denver? Were you in any extracurricular activities? Any clubs? Any particular subjects you were really good at that you studied a lot in your free time?”

The list that spouted out of Wendy’s mouth made Tweek _extra_ nervous. “GAH! NGH! No!”

“Why not?” Wendy probed. Jesus, she was starting to irritate me; I couldn’t imagine what Tweek was feeling. “I mean, you had to’ve had some hobbies --”

“EHH! _No_!” Tweek repeated, his fingers wrapping around the freezing cold can and he lifted his feet onto the couch. “I didn’t do anything, ever!”

“You look like you could’ve been on the baseball team.” Cartman said, hiding a smirk in the crook of Kyle’s neck. “As the _catcher_.”

Kyle barked a laugh. “What the fuck does that even mean? Was that a gay joke?”

Cartman chuckled. “Yep.”

“Well, it was probably the worst I’ve ever heard.”

Kyle and Cartman’s conversation faded into the sidelines as I focused in on Wendy’s obnoxious voice. “You must’ve done _something_ with your time.”

Tweek looked beside himself with anxiety and irritation. “Well, I didn’t.”

Wendy cleared her throat, and began fiddling with the strings of Stan’s sweatshirt. “In high school, I was the captain of the debate team, the cheerleading squad, and the volleyball team, and I was co-captain of the basketball team and the soccer team. I was in student council, and was school president for my junior and senior year.” She shrugged, as if she _wasn’t_ completely bragging. “Sometimes I volunteered at the animal shelter with Stan, and my parents and I would go to the South Park soup kitchen every month to help out there. I also wrote an essay on the allowance of Syrian refugees into Colorado that was nominated for an award presented by the President himself.” She shrugged again. “I won. I wasn’t sure how I felt about receiving an award from Donald Trump, but it was a great experience, anyway.”

“God, would someone shut her up?” Cartman said, his voice sharp with irritation. Can’t say I disagreed with him. “Like anybody cares what this lesbo’s got to say.”

“Shut up, Cartman!” Stan said angrily, pulling his girlfriend closer to him. “Just because she’s smarter and more successful than you, doesn’t mean you have to be a dick to her!”

“Thank you, Stan,” Wendy said, cuddling into his side and smiling up at him dreamily. Stan smiled back.

Cartman fake-stretched, and said, “What a whore,” under his breath, before covering it up with a cough.

Secretly, I think the entire room besides Stan, (including even Bebe), agreed with him, but nobody really had the balls to say it out loud. I mean, I would’ve, if I didn’t care about the sheer drama such a statement would create. I just didn’t want to deal with the aftermath, so I kept my mouth shut.

Stan scrambled to his feet, and rolled up the sleeves of his sweatshirt, glaring daggers at Cartman. “Say that again, and I will fucking _end_ you!” he yelled, his eyebrows furrowed and his mouth twisted into a dangerous frown. Or what I guess Stan _wanted_ to be a dangerous frown.

Cartman rolled his eyes, but, before he could say anything to dig himself even deeper, Kyle held a hand up and said, “Stan, relax. Cartman’s just being Cartman. He’s always been like this, remember? Just ignore him.”

“Don’t tell me to relax, Kyle, your boyfriend’s literally Satan!” Stan answered angrily.

Kyle rolled his eyes, resting his head against Cartman’s. “He’s not that bad, and you know it. You’re just mad because his dickiness is directed towards your girlfriend. He’s like this to everyone.”

“Stop rationalizing his behavior, Kyle!” Stan said, and I swear to fucking God, this asshole _stomped his foot_ like he was fucking five years old all over again. “One day, he’s going to piss the wrong person off and get stabbed to death in a parking lot!”

“Jesus Christ, would you guys calm the fuck down?” I interrupted loudly. “You’ve known each other since preschool, could you maybe get the fuck over it?”

“Oh, shut up, Craig!” Stan said, shifting his glare over to me. “Just make out with your boyfriend and stay out of it!”

Before I even had a chance to get mad(der), Wendy stood up, too, and put a hand on Stan’s shoulder. “Stan, just forget about it. Cartman’s said worse about me in the past. _You’ve_ said worse about me in the past when we were on one of our breaks. Let it go.”

“But, Wendy, he just totally insulted you --”

“Well, he’s an asshole,” Wendy said, shrugging. “You know that. Even Tweek knows that. One of these days, you should just ignore him whenever he starts deflecting his own insecurities onto other people.”

I sucked in a breath. That was a harshly dealt insult. No venom in her voice, just matter-of-fact indifference. The worst kind of insult. To hide my surprise, I took a long drink of my Coors, while at the same time, Tweek leaned over and whispered into my ear,

“Wendy’s kind of a bitch, isn’t she?”

I was completely unprepared for such an un-Tweek-like observation to be inserted right into my ear canal, so, as a result, I almost spit my beer out, I was laughing so hard, and I fell into coughing fits when I managed to swallow the alcohol.

When I recovered I looked over at Tweek, who was smirking at me, and I rolled my eyes. “Jesus, don’t do that, Tweek, you almost killed me.”

“What’s so funny?” Token asked, interrupting my recovery.

I let out a deep breath, and shook my head. “Don’t worry about it. It’s nothing.”

Clyde huffed. “This is so unfair. Tweek’s secretly really funny, isn’t he? Why the hell don’t you share him with us?”

“It’s not about _sharing_ him,” I answered. “I don’t own him. He’s human.” I glanced at Tweek and grinned. “Or, mostly human, at least.”

Tweek frowned at me, put I guess the cold beer can felt too good on his always-burning-up hands for him to punch me. “What the fuck else could I be?”

“You know. Part human, part spaz -- Ouch, Tweek, what the fuck!”

Okay, so that last comment apparently went too far, and Tweek launched a particularly painful punch onto my shoulder. He didn’t look at all sympathetic as I rubbed the spot that would turn into yet another Tweek-induced bruise.

“I’m not a spaz!” he said indignantly, (ie, like a child). “Quit calling me that!”

I huffed, looking away. “You know, punching me isn’t going to stop me.”

I heard slurping coming his direction. I guess he decided he was going to ignore the fact that he actually thought beer was gross. There was an audible gulping sound before Tweek exclaimed,  “GAH! I know. I just don’t know what else to do.”

“How about just never talk to him again?” Kenny asked, a laugh behind his words.

Butters giggled. “Aw, Ken, that’d be mean. A-and besides, I don’t think they can be away from each for long.”

I groaned, drowning my irritation with another drink of beer. I hated that they kept talking about Tweek and I . . . being . . . _together_. It made me feel uncomfortable, awkward, and pissed beyond belief, because nothing could be further from the truth.

I’d decided I would just stop acknowledging it whenever it happened. Seemed like a good idea to me, so I changed the subject. “What time are Tweek and I allowed to leave, so you guys won’t harass us to stay?” I asked, reclining back on the couch.

“Midnight,” Clyde said firmly. “You have to stay until midnight, or I’m handcuffing us together.”

I grimaced at the very thought, and turned to Tweek, who had pulled his knees to his chest and was hugging his legs. Like a child. A child with a beer in his hand.

“Looks like we’re staying till midnight,” I said offhandedly to him.

Tweek sighed, resting his head against the cushion and shot a small smile in my direction. Apparently all anger from his part was forgotten. “GAH! Looks like it.”

* * *

It wasn’t until I heard some drunk dumbass from upstairs scream at the top of his lungs, relatively close to the basement door, “IT’S TOMORROW, BITCH!” that I really relaxed, because that meant that Tweek and I could _finally fucking leave_.

“It’s midnight,” I announced, putting a hand on Tweek’s shoulder. “We’ve officially been around you assholes for seven hours, does that meet your guys’ criteria?”

Kenny rolled his eyes, taking a break from tearing Butters’ clothes off with his gaze to say, “Yeah, sure, whatever.”

I was too fuzzy and happy to get mad at such blatant dismissal, so I just shrugged, and looked to Tweek, who was also looking a little buzzed, (despite the fact that he'd only had two beers), and he immediately caught my eye, and smiled.

I smiled back.

“Red Racer when we get back?” I said quietly, and I didn’t think anybody heard, but I didn’t really have control of the volume of my voice, so they might’ve. I also didn’t really care, though.

Tweek nodded. “GAH! Yeah. Season thirteen?”

“Season thirteen.” I rose to my feet, swaying slightly, but righted myself quickly enough. I’m not, by any sense of the word, a lightweight, but I’d had four beers and had barely eaten that day, so I was just a _little_ tipsy. Enough to make me loosen up, at least. I offered a hand to Tweek so I could pull him to his feet, and he gripped my hand immediately, allowing me to hoist him to a standing position.

Tweek was the exact definition of ‘lightweight’. He’d only had two beers and was already starting to sway where he was standing, but it was especially bad because, in my slight stupor, I accidentally pulled on him too hard, and he crashed into me, knocking me off balance, and I fell back onto the couch. Tweek fell with me, landing half in my lap, half onto the neighboring couch cushion.

Under normal circumstances, I would’ve been slightly embarrassed at that falter, or even irritated, but I just laughed, mostly at him, but at the situation in general.

Shit’s always funnier when you’re drunk.

Tweek started laughing, too, his tiny little giggle-laugh, and he said, “You pushed me over!”

“No, I didn’t,” I said, rolling my eyes. “You weigh, like, ten pounds, and you’re drunk and can’t stand by yourself.”

I felt a punch on my shoulder, but it wasn’t as hard as usual, and the toothy smile on Tweek’s face made my insides melt. “I weigh 118 pounds, for your information, and you’re drunk, too.”

“I am not,” I said, ruffling his hair and grinning as he laughed again. “I’m _barely_ tipsy.”

Tweek pulled on one of the handles of my chullo. “You’re laughing, and you don’t _ever_ laugh.”

If my heart wasn’t so light, I would’ve frowned at that. “What do you mean? I laugh all the time.”

“You laugh _at me_ ,” Tweek answered, rolling his eyes.

“I’m kinda doing that now.”

“Glad to know you’re an asshole even when you’re drunk.”

“Do you seriously expect us to believe that you two aren’t totally gay for each other?” Kenny interrupted our conversation with an eye roll, bringing my attention away with the giddy Tweek to the fact that pretty much everybody’s eyes were on Tweek and I.

“Believe whatever whatever the fuck you want,” I said indifferently, standing up again, and bringing Tweek to his feet, managing to get him upright without falling over again. “Tweek and I are leaving for real now,” I added, flipping off the entire room. “Try not to die from alcohol poisoning.”

Kenny flipped me off back, and said, “Use protection.”

Tweek and I quickly left after _that_ comment.

* * *

“Do you think there’s a planet that’s just coffee?” Tweek asked, his voice contemplative and hopeful. Tweek and I were about halfway to our dorm room, swaying slightly in the chilly, midnight breeze. Tweek was in a musing mood, and was just saying whatever the fuck came to his mind without thinking twice. “Just . . . always hot, strong, _delicious_ coffee?”

I smirked, pulling on one of the handles of my chullo absentmindedly. “No, Tweek, I don’t think there is.”

“But space is infinite,” he whined childishly. “There’s gotta be one _somewhere_ \--”

“I mean, it’s a nice thought,” I interrupted. “Against our knowledge of physics, but a nice thought, anyway.”

Tweek pouted, his posture slouching like a five year old. “That’s fucked up, man. How come there’s a diamond planet, and a water planet that’s on fire, and one that rains glass sideways, but there’s no coffee planet?”

I shrugged. “Science, man. Don’t ask me.”

Tweek huffed, folding his arms over his chest. “Fuck science.”

I snorted. “Don’t take Neil deGrasse Tyson’s name in vain.”

Whatever indignation was in Tweek’s expression vanished, and he did his little giggle-laugh. “Man, Neil’s one of my favorite people.”

“You’re on a first name basis?”

“Oh, we reached that point forever ago.”

I laughed, rustling his hair fondly as we neared our dorm building.

Tweek wasn’t very light on his feet as we climbed up the stairs, so I had to keep a hand on his elbow to make sure hd didn’t fall backwards, and, by the time we were in our room with the door closed, he went straight to his bed, crawling onto the covers and propping himself against the wall.

“So . . . no fort?”

Tweek did his little giggle-laugh, and shook his head. “Not coordinated enough right now.”

I rolled my eyes, and climbed onto his bed next to him. “When are you ever coordinated?”

He shrugged. “Every once in awhile.”

I paused a moment, weighing a response in my mind. I didn’t really come up with anything that fit his comment, so I just said calmly, “Tonight was actually . . . fun.”

Tweek smiled. “Yeah. It was.”

“It probably won’t happen again for awhile, but it was fun while it lasted,” I said with a smirk.

Tweek hiccuped, and then laughed. “Oh, Jesus, man. This is the first time I’ve ever had alcohol.”

I chuckled at that. “Yeah, I can tell. You had half of what I had, and you’re drunker than me.”

Something about what I just said made Tweek freeze, and his posture straighten, and he stared at me with wide eyes. “Oh, God, man, Jesus Christ, am I gonna get a hangover?!”

I tilted my head in thought. He didn’t seem that drunk, but I also didn’t really know what was going inside of his brain, so I couldn’t exactly gage just how drunk he was. I decided to answer honestly. “Probably.”

So, Tweek started freaking the fuck out, so I put a hand to his shoulder, (as was customary in situations identical to that one), and said, “Or maybe not, I don’t really know. Just make yourself some coffee and calm down. If you do have a hangover tomorrow, I’ll help you, but for now, don’t worry about it.”

Tweek took a few long, deep breaths, before nodding quickly. “GAH! Okay . . . I’m gonna make some coffee,” Tweek said absentmindedly, stumbling off of his bed to a haphazardly upright position. He stood quietly for a second, before saying meekly, “Do you want some?”

That caught me by surprise. In all the time I’d known him, Tweek had never asked if I wanted some of his coffee. I mean, I hated coffee and would’ve said no, but the point still stands that Tweek never really gave me that chance.

I shook my head. “No thanks. Still not a coffee drinker.”

Tweek rolled his eyes. “Another thing about you that I will never understand.”

I laughed, and rested my head against the drywall, listening to the comforting noises of the coffee maker whirring to life. I heard some fiddling of coffee mugs clacking together as he picked which one he wanted, (he picked the lime green one, which was the one he always picked, so I never really understood why there was a thought process involved), and a couple buttons pushed on his single-serve coffee maker, and a few “GAH!”s, and “NGH!”s every once in awhile throughout the process.

When the cup was mad, he carefully climbed back onto his bed, holding his mug high so that he didn’t spill any of it, and, surprisingly, it all remained in his cup. I guess it was just because it was coffee; Tweek would’ve been so pissed off if he spilled _coffee_ , of all things.

When he was situated, I looked over at him, all huddled in a corner of his bed, staring into his mug of coffee with wide, thoughtful eyes.  He seemed completely oblivious to my gaze, which was a good thing, because I was just fucking staring at his profile. E was shaking, like always, but there was a more . . . pleasant aura to him. I mean, I never really found Tweek unpleasant, but his shaking was almost always one of the bad things about him, from his perspective. He hated shaking; it meant he was anxious, or nervous. But, in that moment, he had a soft smile on his face, and, even though his eyes were wide, they were warm.

The entire day, there was something on my mind that I hadn’t even realized was on my mind until I was staring at his profile and thinking back on the events of the day. It was something that was insinuated constantly; something that I bruised my knuckles big time about; something that might make some of the other guys' teasing make sense. And, because I was tipsy and loose-lipped, I blurted out, “Hey, Tweek?”

Tweek looked over at me with his wide, hazel . . . actually kinda mesmerizing eyes . . . “Yeah?”

“Are you gay?”

The question seemed to catch him off guard, which I guess was fair, because I really gave him no warning whatsoever that I would ask something so personal.

“GAH! _What_?”

“Gay,” I repeated, drunkenly resting my head on the somewhat-chipping drywall, and gazed at him. “Are you?”

He was ridiculously on edge. Seriously, he looked like he was about to have a heart attack, and his head kept jerking to the side like he was being electrocuted or some shit.

“I . . . GAH! I don’t . . . I don’t know what you mean -”

I rolled my eyes. “Alright, Tweek, fine. I’ll give you a scenario. You walk into a room, prolly gonna make coffee or daydream or something. And then you see a completely naked guy jerking off. Is your dick hard, yes or no?”

Tweek closed one eye, and looked at his crotch. “You mean . . . right now?”

I stared at him blankly. _He’s either plastered beyond return, or he’s really fucking naive_ , I thought flatly. Either way, I didn’t really mind it, because, no matter how hard I tried, I literally couldn’t picture a Tweek in a compromising position, or propositioning someone for sex. “No,” I said slowly. “In my hypothetical situation. Are you turned on?”

“Well,” he said in a trembling voice. I’d never seen a human being with so red a face before. “Well, I guess . . . it would depend --”

I raised an eyebrow at the response. “On?”

“Well . . . well, I don’t know!” he exclaimed, clutching at the misbuttoned shirt that was already pretty twisted on his body. “I’ve never walked in on a naked guy jerking off before!”

 _Did he just_. . . My mind was melting. The words sounded so weird coming from his mouth, his voice all squeaky and childlike. “Well . . . you’ve jerked off before, right?”

His face turned fucking scarlet, and I felt a dumb grin cross my face. _He’s the cutest little shit I’ve ever seen_. . . my drunken brain thought. “I don’t see what that has to do with -”

“Well, just imagine some guy doing exactly what you do when you jerk off.”

Tweek looked so fucking anxious, his hands trembling as he started to pick and scratch at his skin. “I . . . Craig, can we talk about something else?”

I raised an eyebrow. “Like what?”

His eyes lifted to meet mine, and there was a defiance -- a sort of stubbornness that I wasn’t accustomed to -- shining in his hazel eyes. “Are _you_ gay?”

“No,” I said, perhaps a bit too quickly. “No, vagina is just fine for me.”

Tweek narrowed his eyes and said in a patronizing voice, “Did that question make you _uncomfortable_?”

I squirmed under his gaze. “I mean . . . yeah, I guess, but that’s just ‘cause you’re so --”

“I’m so what?” Tweek asked shortly, and, without waiting for an answer, spat back, “Because you’re so, too.”

My eyebrows furrowed. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You tell me,” he said bitterly, folding his arms over his chest.

“Alright, Jesus Christ,” I said, holding my arms up in surrender. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you all . . . uncomfortable. I was just wondering.”

“Why were you wondering?” Tweek asked, his anger dissipating a bit. “That’s a weird thing to wonder.”

I shrugged. I really didn’t have much control over my words. They just kept coming, and, if I wasn’t so tipsy and happy, that would’ve pissed me off. “I don’t know. You make me curious.”

Tweek’s cheeks turned a light pink. “GAH! Curious?”

I nodded. “Yeah. I never care about other people like I care about you. Was Clyde gay the entire time I was best friends with him? No fucking clue. Never asked. I mean, I did know all sorts of shit about him when I was a kid, but it was never _because_ I asked. It was because he doesn’t shut his mouth, _ever_. You don’t ever talk about yourself.” I shrugged again. “Makes me curious. I’m never curious, and like I said, I don’t usually care about people.”

Tweek smiled shyly at me. “But you care about me?”

I felt my cheeks heat up, but, at the time, I blamed it on the alcohol in my system, and I smiled at him. “You’re my best friend, of course I do. I know I make fun of you all the time, because you _ask_ for it pretty much all the time, but I don’t mean anything by it. I just think it’s funny. And those guys apparently beat you up because they thought you were gay, and I was just . . .” I shrugged. Again. “I was just curious.”

The happiness on Tweek’s face melted away, and he looked away sadly.  His lapse into silence was so abrupt that I frowned at him, and it was even worse, because I didn’t really think there was anything in what I just said that could or would have made him sad. “What?”

Tweek curled into himself, taking a long gulp of his coffee, and staring at the swirling brown liquid as it settled in his mug. “Listen, Craig . . .”  he said softly, his thumb stroking the body of his cup. “I don’t talk about myself because then people would know things about me, and then they could . . . I don’t know, use my shit ton of baggage as leverage, and blackmail me into robbing banks, or luring prostitutes to their death, or . . .” He gulped, his nose scrunching up, and his mouth twitched. “Or something like that . . .”

I patted him on the shoulder, which successfully brought his gaze up to mine. “Tweek, I don’t fuck with that shit,” I said, and my attempted reassurance lacked eloquence so badly, that I actually cringed at my own words. He actually seemed a little amused by my falter, and gave me a small smile, but there was still that hesitancy, that sadness, behind his eyes, and it physically _hurt_ me to see that. “I mean . . . what I mean is, uh . . .” I let out a long breath, and took my hand from his shoulder. There was no fucking way I was gonna be able to speak coherently while also feeling his warm, trembling body under my hand. It was too distracting, so I took away that distraction, and I found I could fare much better. “First of all, who the fuck am I gonna tell? I’m with you, like, 24 hours a day, and the only reason I’m ever not with you, is when we’re sleeping or off in class learning useless shit. Second of all, I’m extremely good at keeping secrets. I don’t talk. Ever. When I’m not with you, there really isn’t much to say. And squealing on your best friend is probably the shittiest thing someone in my position can do.”

Tweek just let out his anxious noises in response, and that didn’t sit well with me.

I frowned firmly and said, “Tweek. Look at me.”

It took a few seconds, but Tweek’s eyes finally swept over to me, and they were wide and somehow shaking. His fucking eyes were shaking.

His. Fucking. _Eyes_.

He was terrified, and he didn’t believe me when I told him I wouldn’t do anything against him if he did end up being gay.

Or, you know. Whatever.

I tried to smile at him, but it was really hard to do that when he was so scared. It _radiated_ off of him. “I’m serious, you know. You can tell me anything.”

Tweek’s mouth opened and closed rapidly, like a fish out of water to give you a completely overused metaphor, but his eyes wouldn’t leave my face for a second. He was doing that whole ‘studying to see if he could trust me’ thing, but that time around, I had my fingers crossed in my mind that he would, because it wasn’t like any other time that something emotionally distressing occurred in our friendship. The moment was more fragile than I could’ve ever imagined any moment being; there was a small seed inside of me that was yearning to be trusted with this one thing, this one, tiny, massive thing . . .

After what felt like for-fucking- _ever_ , Tweek let out a shaky sigh, and said in a completely broken voice, “But, Craig, it’s . . . I’m . . . Craig, I’m . . . I’m really scared . . .”

Jesus Christ, my heart pretty much smashed in two at the expression on his face. He shifted away from me, his eyes fixed on the coffee in his hand and his teeth digging into his bottom lip.

“What are you scared of, Tweek?” I asked him, my voice pitched low and as soothing as possible. I had never felt the need to comfort anybody in my life, but in that moment I would’ve done anything to get him smiling again.

“My parents . . .” My stomach dropped. Tweek hardly ever talked about his parents, but when he did, it was never anything good. “They . . . They used to threaten to sell me into slavery, and I never knew if they were kidding, but if they were serious, then they _can’t_ know about me. I don’t know what they’d do, and I don’t have any other family, so I’d be all alone if they disowned me.” Tweek’s eyes were filled with tears when he looked back up at me, but he only held eye contact for a few seconds before looking away, and taking a comforting swallow of his coffee.

“You . . .” I gulped, and my heart raced in my chest when I realized what I was about to say. “You wouldn’t be alone, Tweek. You’d have me. I know I’m not your parents, and you’ve only known me for not even a year, but I wouldn’t let you be alone.” I hesitantly placed a hand on his shoulder, squeezing tightly and feeling my heart break just a tiny bit more at how horrifically he was trembling. “You’re my best friend. And if they do disown you, then I’ll . . . I’ll kidnap you, and take you everywhere with me. And then _neither_ of us would be alone.”

The word ‘kidnap’ didn’t really make him panic when I said it, I’d noticed. When I said it, he didn’t even bat an eye, which would probably be the exact opposite if it were anyone else.

“You’d really kidnap me?” he asked, his voice shaky and quiet.

“Of course I would,” I said immediately.

The room fell silent for a long moment, the only sound being Tweek’s erratic whimpers and moans. Without warning, he looked up at me with his wide eyes and said, “I’d kidnap you, too.”

My heart filled with warmth and all sorts of other emotion-y shit as I let myself relax into his gaze. I didn’t know exactly how to react to that statement, because I didn’t really know what he meant, but the moment was too fragile for me to ask questions, so I said instead, “Thanks. I think.”

Tweek smiled shortly, but it almost immediately gave way to an unwelcome frown.

“Gay or not,” I said softly, responding to his sudden sadness and fear, “You’ll always be my best friend. My . . . platonic . . . soul mate. Okay?”

Tweek blushed, and he shifted slightly closer to me. “Okay.” His face was still full of doubt, apprehension, and that ever-present anxiety, and I almost felt frustrated that I was having so much trouble bringing him down to earth, and away from his panicked delusions.

“And, just in case you’re still scared, remember this, Tweek,” I said, in as comforting a voice as I could muster. And then I did something that I had never done before: I reached for him, and brought his trembling body to my chest. His response to my, rather bold for me, move was immediate, and he wrapped his arms around me, and nuzzled his face in the crook of my neck. Resting my chin on his head, I said quietly, “You’re good enough. You’re smart enough. And doggone it. People like you.” Tweek let out this sigh, but I could tell he wasn’t as scared anymore. He was actually calming, and his body even stopped shaking. How and why the _fuck_ that calmed him down, I will never know. But, it made Tweek’s previously-shallow breaths even out, and he relaxed in my arms.

I sighed. For one of the first times since I’d met Tweek, he actually had a reason to be so freaked out. I mean, my parents might not have been saints, but I could not remember a single time where they threatened to give me away, to anyone. Especially not to some stranger as some _slave_. And Tweek may have been a delusional caffeine-addict, but _I’d_ never sell him into slavery.

And . . . well, even if I _was_ gay, (which I wasn’t), I knew that my parents would never _actually_ disown me. My dad might’ve been disappointed in me, but he would’ve gotten over it. Mom would’ve just shrugged, and said me she told me so. Tricia wouldn’t care at all; she’d probably start pointing out guys that she’d think I’d look good with. The point is, I knew I was ensured a family. Tweek didn’t have that luxury.

As I assessed Tweek’s situation, I buried my face in his untamed hair and inhaled his scent. Even his hair smelled like coffee. I began to hate myself because that particular smell didn’t make me sick to my stomach anymore.

It made me think of him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I guess I kind of went overboard, too, but, I don't know, I thought it was funny. Made me laugh, anyway!
> 
> Also, I know I ask for a lot at the end of every chapter, but could you please let me know how I did with Butters? I'm the least confident with him when it comes to emulating characters. 
> 
> Next chapter might be awhile, forewarning. Just because I know basically what's going to happen after this chapter, in the next one, but I have to piece some things together.


	12. You Suck At Paying Attention

I let Tweek sleep on me for about fifteen minutes, before I decided I wanted to sleep, too, and I figured it would be too weird to do that with my arms literally wrapped around my best friend like a human cocoon. And falling asleep like that would be especially weird, considering there was something I could do to _not_ have my arms around him.

I slowly shifted my body and his body so that I was on the floor, standing over him, and he was on his back on his bed. His arms tightened around me instinctively, and he nuzzled closer to me, but I just let out a breath and eased him off of me. He only woke up when I had finally pried his arms from around my neck, and the only physical contact we were making were my hands on his upper arms. His wide, hazel eyes blinked open sluggishly, staring up at me questioningly, but I just smiled and said,

“Go to sleep, Tweek,”

To which he nodded distractedly, burrowing into his mattress and his eyes flickered shut. “Mmm’kay,” he said softly, hugging his blanket to his chest.

He just . . . he was so pure, and innocent, and he deserved so much more than what he’d gotten. Seriously, he didn’t deserve to be beaten up in an alley. He didn’t deserve to have a nearly crippling anxiety disorder. (Come to think of it, in my drunken mind, I wondered why I hadn’t ever seen him take medication for that . . .) He didn’t deserve to be deathly afraid of other people, he didn’t deserve to have to hide who he was on the inside, he didn’t deserve such shitty parents, he didn’t deserve fucking any of that shit.

I found myself watching him sleep again. It was an oddly mesmerizing sight. There were no creases around his eyes; his mouth was relaxed, his lips in a permanent almost-smile; his arms were hugging his blankets like it was a giant, flat, faceless stuffed animal.

There wasn’t an _inch_ of evil or maliciousness in Tweek’s body, and yet he had all this shit pushed onto him, and he _didn’t fucking deserve that_.

I changed fairly quickly, as it was getting rather late, and I was starting to sway even more, due to my being so tired. I clambered into my bed, pulling the blankets up to my neck, and shifted around until I was comfortable enough to sleep.

I looked over at Tweek again, smiled at his unchanged position, and mumbled to him, “‘Night, Tweek. ‘Best friend love you.”

And that was all I remember before I was dead to the world. I just knew that the next morning I woke up feeling sooo happy. I mean, I had a distant headache, mostly behind my eyes, and I actually sort of wanted coffee, but that didn’t matter, because the night before had been _amazing_.

Somebody came out to me. And not only somebody, but my best friend. My best friend trusted _me_ enough to confide one of their biggest secrets with _me_. _Me_. Craig fucking _Tucker_. I had never been trusted with anything even remotely valuable in my life, mostly because people would always tell me I give off the ‘doesn’t give a fuck and would squeal on you if it would somehow further my life agenda’ vibe, which, to be clear, is untrue. I very much understand and understood the importance of secrets and keeping them, having a few under my belt myself.

None of which were to see the light of day.

Okay, so, needless to say, I woke up before Tweek. This wasn’t very uncommon, and, considering he was really pretty out of it the night before, I figured he’d probably want some sleep.

I sat up and stretched, feeling and hearing a few pleasant cracks in my back. I relished in the feeling, before realizing that the sun was just barely shining into our room, and it dawned on me that . . . it was _really_ fucking early in the morning, and I was awake, and I didn’t know why.

I checked my phone, and actually got irritated when it told me it was only _eight in the fucking morning_ , and I was awake enough that the option of sleep was no longer on the table. My mild headache probably wouldn’t allow for it without a fight, and I was already sitting up, anyway.

I debated what I should do with my time before Tweek woke up. I wasn’t sure if he wanted a heart to heart about last night, and, even though I was extremely against the idea of another (albeit sober) confession, I would’ve sucked it up for that one occasion, and made myself available for when he did eventually wake up. Which didn’t appear to be anytime soon, judging by his open, snoring mouth, and his sprawled-out body.

I thought maybe I’d scroll through Facebook, or maybe binge watch unsolved mysteries videos on Youtube, but I decided against both of those options the second I smelled myself.

Yeah. Not good.

I still had the faint scent of beer on me, and there was that stale, undeniable, difficult-to-describe stench of I-got-somewhat-drunk-last-night on my clothes. I was in dire need of a shower, so I figured that was top priority.

As I grabbed all my shower stuff, flinging cloths and a towel over my shoulder, and left my dorm room, I thought about how lucky I was that the showers in my dorm building were actually kind of decent. And, because I guess people from South Park and surrogate people from South Park had the best timing, apparently, Tweek and I always managed to get there when it was completely, or at least mostly, empty.

Yes, Tweek and I used to shower together. Not . . . _together_ , together, we just went at the same time, because ever since Tweek saw the shower scene in _Psycho_ when he was in 10th grade, he didn’t like being _too_ alone when he showered. Well, that, and it’d also be kind of weird if we went down to the bathrooms in shifts, instead of just getting it done and over with at the same time.

But, no, the showers were fine. Not too filthy, but they weren’t sparkling, either. They were what you would expect out of a guys-only dorms shower room. There were twelve shower stalls, and Tweek and I had both claimed the two in the way back, right next to each other, and, thank fuck Tweek usually got done at just about the same time as me. It would’ve been extremely awkward if I had to ever make the decision to wait for him to be done, or abandon him for our dorm room.

Tweek, like he was at everything, was a weird showerer. As tiny as he was, the stalls apparently weren’t big enough for him, because his elbows always somehow managed to smack against the wall, and he would swear sharply, and I would have to actually bite my lip to avoid laughing at him. He was the smallest eighteen year old I’d ever met in my entire life; _how_ he managed to be that clumsy, I would never understand . . .

Speaking of clumsy, he would also drop his shampoo bottle, on average, three times in the span of his entire shower. Like, I get that, when you’re showering, everything is slipperier, but I’m not fucking exaggerating when I say he could not hold onto that bottle to save his life. Maybe it had to do with his twitching thing, I had no fucking clue, just like how I had no fucking clue as to how he couldn’t just _not drop the bottle_.

And he clearly used to sing in the shower back at his house, because every once in awhile, I would hear a broken lyric, or a disembodied hum, come from his stall. It always made me laugh, because after he accidentally let out any noise at all, he would clear his throat, “GAH!”, and then there would be complete and utter silence for a bit, before he would slip up again.

It was . . .

Fuck, it was _cute_. I won’t fucking deny that, and I won’t even say ‘no homo’, because there is no way that Tweek’s behavior in the shower could be described as anything _other_ than . . . _that_.

Whatever, fucking tangent again. Just another change in me that I can blame on Tweek.

* * *

It’s never taken me very long to shower. Five, ten minutes tops if I’m super hungover or just really like the feeling of the water, so I finished somewhere between those two numbers, and toweled off quickly. I heard the bathroom door open, and a couple rowdy guys come in, so I dressed as fast as I was capable of, considering the time of morning, and left before they could process the fact that there was someone already in there.

As I was climbing up the stairs to the third floor, I fiddled my clothing, making sure it wasn’t too twisted around my body, and, when I made it in front of my dorm room door, I pulled on the strings of my chullo, adjusting it so that all my hair was covered, as was my standard look, and unlocked my dorm room door, closing it behind me. I expected Tweek to still be asleep, but, like most things with Tweek, my expectations were completely backwards in that he was sitting up with his back against the wall, and a mug of steaming coffee in his hands. He had a _very_ tired expression on his face, the bags under his eyes more pronounced than usual and his half-opened eyes blinking blearily at his coffee, but at the same time, he looked more at peace than I’d ever seen him before.

“Oh, you’re awake,” I observed, crossing the room and tossing my pajamas and my phone onto my bed. “How’s your head?”

Tweek didn’t even jump when he heard me speak, he just glanced up and smiled at me. “It actually doesn’t hurt as bad as I was afraid it would. It’s fuzzy, and a little numb, but it isn’t throbbing or anything like that.” He paused for a moment, before adding, “And I’m surprised _you’re_ awake. When I saw your bed was empty, I was a little worried that you might’ve been kidnapped by the Russian mob and used as a trading piece for government information and cocaine.”

I stared at him, but he didn’t seem to notice the implications of that statement. “You thought I was kidnapped and didn’t _do_ anything?”

Tweek rolled his eyes. “Well, what are the odds that you’re going to be kidnapped on _this_ day, at _this_ place, for _that_ reason? I mean, why would the Russian mob want _you_ , of all people?”

I don’t know what it was, but the fact that he could now dash his own delusions made me just . . . I was so proud of him, I had no idea I could feel a warmth so pleasant for another human being’s success. I _almost_ pointed out that he wouldn’t’ve said that, I don’t know, _last night_ , but I didn’t really want to draw attention to his progress, on the off-chance that I might jinx it somehow, so I mock-frowned at him, and said in my monotone voice, “I’m very wantable, you know.”

Tweek laughed happily. “Sure, maybe to someone like _me_ , but not to the Russian mob.”

I was pretty sure that Tweek had about 0% of a normal human filter. He seemed completely oblivious to what he’d just said, but Jesus fuck, my entire face turned red, I could feel it. It took maybe five seconds for Tweek’s claim to make sense to him, but, when it did, he squealed loudly, his eyes blowing wide open, and he ducked his face behind his cup of coffee. “Oh, _God_ , oh, _Jesus_ , I didn’t mean it like _that_ , I just meant . . . I just meant as like -- as like, a . . . a _friend_ , not a, uh . . . Oh, _Jesus_ , forget I even said anything, oh, God!”

I stared at him for a few more seconds, before forcing myself to relax, and I smirked at what little I could see of his flustered face. I was still as red as all get out, but I tried to pretend like I wasn’t, and said, “I know you didn’t mean it like that. Calm down.”

Tweek whimpered for a few seconds, and I let him collect himself quietly. He recovered quicker than I thought he would, taking a long breath after about ten seconds of calming down, and he glanced back up at me with his wide hazel eyes. “Sorry, Craig . . .”

I raised an eyebrow. “For what?”

Tweek’s thumb stroked the body of his mug. He had started shaking again. “GAH! Well, it’s just that since I kinda told you . . .” He let out a short breath, hunching over into himself. “About that whole _thing_ . . . I don’t want you thinking anything just ‘cause I’m . . . _that way._ ”

I plopped down on my bed, mirroring his position, except I had my arms folded between my legs and my chest. “You know, it might surprise you, but I _do_ know what being gay means.” He groaned at the word ‘gay’, (I guessed he just wasn’t comfortable talking about it explicitly yet), but I ignored him. “Just because you like other guys, doesn’t mean you automatically like _every_ guy. Just like how I’m straight, but I don’t automatically like every chick. I’m not going to start acting all weird around you now. As far as I’m concerned, nothing’s really changed.” I shrugged. “You’re still my Tweek.”

Okay, so apparently I _was_ in the mood for a heart-to-heart. Apparently more so than Tweek, who looked just about ready to sprint out the door. “GAH! NGH! Can we _please_ change the subject?!”

I shrugged again. “If you want, whatever.”

Tweek nodded in appreciation, turning to his mug of coffee.

So, I had apparently not been paying Tweek much attention when he drank his coffee, because I found myself watching in confusion as Tweek brought his coffee up to his mouth, but, instead of taking a sip of the boiling liquid, he sucked in a breath, practically inhaling the coffee as he did so. He smiled this really small, satisfied smile, (you wouldn’t’ve been able to tell if you didn’t know how to read Tweek like a textbook), before taking a long gulp.

I raised an eyebrow. “Um, Tweek? What are you doing?”

He looked up from his coffee and cocked his head. “I’m . . . drinking my coffee. Why?”

“No, dude, you just . . . you’re just . . .” I waved my hand in the air like that would somehow explain the weird shit he was doing. “Inhaling it with your mouth.”

He mouthed, ‘inhaling it with my . . .’ before I guess he realized what I meant, because he rolled his eyes and grinned. “I’m breathing my coffee. I always do that before I drink it. I suck in the coffee fumes. Sometimes it’s better than the coffee itself. Not usually, though.”

My eyebrow remained raised, as I thought back to every other time I’d managed to see him drink his coffee. Which, I repeat, wasn’t very often. “I never noticed that before.”

He shrugged. “I’ve always done it. You just suck at paying attention.”

I couldn’t argue with that, so I didn’t try to. I did, however, think it was necessary to say, “You do a lot of weird stuff, don’t you?”

He frowned and quirked his eyebrows in thought. “It’s not really all that weird, is it?”

I gave him a deadpanned look. “You literally just said to me, ‘I’m breathing my coffee.’ That’s pretty weird, dude.”

“NGH! And you _literally_ just said to me, ‘You’re just inhaling it with your mouth,’ but you don’t see _me_ asking questions,” he said with a huff, turning back to his drink and letting his hands curl around the mug protectively.

I grinned and just . . . looked at him. He was so goddamn funny, even if he never meant to be. Everything he did was just so . . . Tweek. It was pretty sweet having a friend like him. He just did weird stuff and then acted like the weird stuff he did wasn’t even weird to begin with. As much as I loved leading a boring lifestyle, he was the kind of exciting that I could more than tolerate. The oddity of Tweek was mundane and simple. Just the way I like my oddities.

“Craig?” Tweek’s voice said, breaking my contemplation. “What are you looking at?”

My eyes focused, and I saw that I was just staring straight fucking at him, and he was looking back uncomfortably. How long I’d been looking . . . no fucking clue. Long enough for a coffee-wielding Tweek to notice, I guess. “Uh . . . I don’t know,” I said, flustered. “I just sort of zoned out for a second there.”

Before Tweek could say anything, I heard a dinging noise coming from my bedside table, telling me I had a text message, and I jumped on that immediately to escape the awkward conversation I had found myself in.

It was from Kenny, oddly enough, (he had insisted on exchanging numbers during the party the night before), and the text only had the message: _Funniest shit you will ever see_ , followed by a video, with the first imagine being a red-faced Kyle, sitting on a bed with a mug of something, probably coffee, in his hands. Beside him on the bed was Cartman, who was laying on his back, his hands cupping his eyes, and I couldn’t tell if he was sleeping or just had a raging headache. I was a little . . . intrigued. Kyle and Cartman were _really_ fun to make fun of.

Before I started the video, I looked over at Tweek, who had turned his gaze back to his cup of coffee. “Hey, Tweek?” I waited until he was looking at me before holding my phone up so he could distantly see the message, and said, “Kenny just texted me a dumb video of a hungover Kyle and Cartman. Wanna watch it?”

Tweek’s posture straightened, and he smiled widely at me. “Sure.”

I jumped to my feet, and made my over to him so I could sit next to him on his bed. I shuffled around until I was as comfortable as I was gonna get, before hitting play.

Dialogue began immediately, and, of course, it was Kenny’s voice, off-screen, that came through first. “So . . . Kyle, Cartman . . . how are you guys feeling?”

Kyle groaned, slouching down and staring with slightly dead eyes into his probably-coffee. “Kill me,” was all he said, his voice gravelly and irritated.

“If I did that, then _Cartman_ would kill _me_ , and I value my life.”

Kyle grimaced, his eyes closing tightly. “Please tell me we didn’t . . .”

“Didn’t . . . what?” Kenny asked, and, even though I couldn’t see his face, I could hear the smirk in his voice.

Kyle glanced up sharply, but I guess Kenny hid his phone well enough that Kyle didn’t notice, and therefore didn’t freak out about it. “You know what I’m talking about, asshole.”

“I’m afraid I don’t --”

“Fine, _be_ a dickhole,” Kyle spat, looking away again. “I’m talking about . . .” all venom was cleaned from Kyle’s voice, turning rapidly into sheepish embarrassment. “Did . . . Did Cartman and I sing . . . _that_ song?”

Kenny laughed. “Oh, yeah,” he said emphatically. “Lots of times. I counted a total of four, but then I had to stop Craig and Tweek from leaving, so who _knows_ how many times you guys belted All 4 One in the time it took me to find them --”

Kyle groaned, resting his mouth on the lip of his cup and squeezing his eyes shut. “Seriously, I should learn to just not drink ever.”

“Where would be in the fun in _that_ \--”

“Jesus, Kyenny, would you shut up, there are people suffering here!” Cartman interrupted loudly, without moving the arm from his eyes. “Just because you bleed vodka doesn’t mean the rest of us are natural-born alcoholics!”

“You know that song is, like, twenty years old, right?” Kenny asked, completely ignoring the insult. “You guys are like old people that are stuck in their ‘prime’ --”

“It’s _Cartman’s_ fault,” Kyle grumbled moodily, taking a long gulp of his coffee.

“Just how is it _my_ fault, you goddamn Jew?” Cartman asked, never moving.

“ _You_ sang it to me first.”

“Well, I’m sorry, but you just _had_ to slut yourself out for that bitch Nicole --”

“You know, I only really liked her ‘cause I heard she liked me first --”

“That doesn’t make you sound any better --”

“I’m not _trying_ to make myself sound better, fatass --”

“So you accept your status as the group whore, then?”

Kyle huffed irritably, taking another drink from his coffee. “Can we _not_ argue right now? My head hurts too much to argue.”

Cartman paused thoughtfully, before saying, “Okay, fine. Truce?” He lifted the arm not covering his eyes, and held a hand out for Kyle to shake, which he did without a moment’s hesitation.

“Truce.”

Kenny snorted behind the camera. “Are you _sure_ you guys aren’t five? Don’t you think we’ve passed the age where ‘truces’ were a thing?”

“Don’t annoy them, asshole!” another voice exclaimed from off screen. It sounded like Marsh, but I couldn’t tell.

“Why the hell not?” Kenny asked, his voice laced with amusement. “It’s funny.”

“It is _not_ funny, because they’re finally going to shut up, and you’re just provoking them,” that voice said again.

“Stan, just because Wendy didn’t put out last night, doesn’t mean you get to act like the world’s biggest asshole,” Cartman grumbled, finally letting go of his face to push himself back up on his elbows. He shot a glare in someone’s direction, (presumably Stan), that was off camera, before shifting his hips slightly and leaned back again, resting his head in Kyle’s lap.

“You didn’t get any?” Kenny asked, his voice actually shocked. “You guys _always_ fuck when you get back together!”

“Yeah, well . . .” Stan groaned under his breath. “She said that our relationship before ‘wasn’t working’, so we should ‘try something new’, and apparently that means no sex until we can reach a ‘romantic understanding’.”

“Weak,” Kyle said, running his fingers through Cartman’s hair absently.

“Totally weak,” Cartman agreed. “Kyle puts out all the fucking time --”

A shocked grunting noise left Kyle’s throat, but what really caught my attention was the retching noise that came from off screen. The camera immediately changed direction, zooming in on Stan, who was sitting on an empty bed on the other side of the room. His entire t-shirt front was covered in his own vomit. I grimaced, and Tweek groaned in disgust beside me.

“Stan, did you just _puke_?” Kenny asked, but he didn’t even sound grossed out at all. The asshole was trying not to laugh.

Stan groaned, wiping at his mouth. “You guys can’t talk about that shit when I’m hungover,” he scolded, his lips twisted into a irritated frown. (In the background, you could hear Kenny’s strangled almost-laughter, but it was clear he was holding back.) Stan glared down at himself, before taking a somewhat calming breath, and muttered, “Can someone grab me a towel?”

Kenny completely let loose at that, the camera taking a nosedive to the floor as the sounds of his laughter interrupted all further banter. There were some more voices after that, but there was so much happening all at once, that you couldn’t tell voices apart from each other. Finally, after a few seconds of chaos, the phone was picked up again by a pissed-looking, vomit-covered Stan, and the video ended.

I blinked a few times at the abrupt conclusion, before turning my gaze to Tweek, who looked equally confused.

“Was that the funniest thing you’ve ever seen?” I asked blankly, lifting my phone up with my hand to show what I was talking about.

Tweek shook his head immediately. “GAH! No . . . was it supposed to be?”

“According to Kenny, yes.”

At that, Tweek hummed thoughtfully, and said, almost as if he didn’t even realize he was speaking out loud, “You know, I like Kenny.”

I frowned at that, turning my screen black and setting my phone down. “He’s got a boyfriend, dude.”

Tweek’s face turned a bright shade of red, and he shook his head wildly, turning to stare at me with wide eyes. “GAH! Oh, Jesus, not like _that_!”

I studied his blushing face, not quite liking his reaction, but not knowing _why_ I didn’t like his reaction, so I ignored my irritation. He didn’t exactly look like what you would expect someone to look like if they liked someone, but, (before he started freaking out), there was a fondness in his expression that didn’t sit right with me. But, hey. It wasn’t any of my fucking business, so I didn’t really have a reason to get all upset over bullshit. “It’s okay, you know. If you do. I mean, I won’t sugar coat it, though: you and Kenny won’t happen, because Kenny is perpetually latched onto Butters, but if you like him, you can tell me.”

Tweek’s red face scowled at me, and he put aside his coffee to fold his arms over his chest defiantly. Or, you know. Like a child. “I  _don’t_!”

I raised an eyebrow. “Are you sure?”

“GAH! _Yes_!”

Some weight inside me lifted at how determined he sounded. I mean, it wasn’t like I was really involved in Tweek’s decision to like whoever the fuck he wanted to, so I, theoretically, shouldn’t have been . . . _protective_ of him in that sense, but I couldn’t help but be just a little bit relieved that Tweek _didn’t_ like Kenny. “Oh.” I turned my face away to hide my smile. “Okay.”

There was a beat of silence, before Tweek stuttered out, “Why?”

Having regained control over my facial features, I turned back to look at him. “Why what?”

Tweek was jittering slightly, and had his hands clasped around his mug of coffee again. “GAH! Why are you so worried about it?”

I blinked. “About what?”

Tweek frowned at me, unimpressed. “About me liking Kenny.” He blinked a few times before averting his eyes and clearing his throat. “I mean, about you _thinking_ I like Kenny,” he corrected awkwardly. “Why are you worried about it?”

I frowned. “Well, because he already has a boyfriend.”

“GAH! _I_ know that --”

“Right, I know you know that, but I just . . . I don’t know . . . I didn’t want . . . um . . .” my voice trailed off, and I scratched my head underneath my hat. It was hard to get the words out, mostly because I didn’t really know what words were trying to get out in the first place. Finally, after some mental wrestling, I settled on a simple, “I didn’t want you to . . . get your hopes up, I guess.”

There was a beat of silence, before Tweek snorted. “GAH! So, _yesterday_ you were acting like my mom, and _now_ you’re acting like my own personal guard dog.”

I frowned at him, tugging lightly on his thick, unbrushed, blonde hair. He yelped, shifting on the bed so he was further away from me, and glared at me, but I just glared back, equally halfheartedly. “Or, you know. I’m acting like a _good_ best friend. Asshole.”

Tweek’s glare softened a bit at that, and he nodded, accommodatingly. “Okay, fine. _You’reagoodbestfriend._ ” He spoke quickly, like getting the words out was a pain for his _highness_ , before he added, his voice pitched high and whiny, “Can we watch Red Racer now?"

I rolled my eyes. “As long as you make the fort.”

* * *

Sunday was irrelevant. Tweek and I just hung out like we normally did, watching Red Racer and talking about dumb shit.

Monday was _also_ irrelevant.

But _Tuesday_ was when something different that had actual value to my life happened.

Before class was fairly normally, although Tweek was wearing a . . . paper fucking hat, for some reason, in his sleep. He didn’t have classes on Tuesday, so I just got ready quietly, so as not to wake him, but I couldn’t help just . . . staring at him and trying to figure out why the fuck he was wearing a paper hat, and how it got there to begin with. Because he didn’t go to sleep with it on.

No, nothing particularly interesting happened until I was leaving the science building, (where I actually spent quite a lot of my class time), and I adjusted my bookbag on my shoulder, starting my way back to my dorm room. Class was boring, as usual. Besides biology, environmental science was my least favorite class. I would’ve even preferred my history class over environmental science. Maybe. Depends on the day, but that day, _fuck_ yes.

I had only been walking for maybe a minute tops, when I felt a hand tug on one of the strings of my chullo hat. Not expecting it, my head jerked down, and I let out a noise of surprise, and, when I turned to glare at whoever it was, expecting one of the members of the Asshole Quartet, I had to pause in surprise at the culprit.

When I turned around I had instantly made eye contact with an equally pissed . . . _The Bitch_. I can’t even remember what her fucking name is. But it was _The Bitch_.

You know the one.

I had no fucking clue _why_ she was so pissed, but it apparently involved me.

I overcame my surprise fast enough, and glared back. “What do you want?” I asked, my voice slightly more biting than it’s normal monotone.

“I need to talk to you,” she snapped back, grabbing hold of my wrist and tugging me down the sidewalk. Or _trying_ to tug me down the sidewalk. She was weaker than Tweek was, surprisingly. So, maybe she wasn’t a cheerleader back in high school.

Maybe she was just a bitch.

So, needless to say, she stumbled when I didn’t budge an inch, and her glare worsened when she recovered and looked back up at me. “I _said_ , I need to talk to you!”

“Yeah, that’s great for you, bitch, but I don’t need, or _want_ to talk to you, so would you mind letting me go?” I asked, jerking my arm from her grasp. I know, I know. She’s a chick, I’m a guy, I shouldn’t have been violent with her. But, see, I wasn’t being violent with her. She grabbed me first.

Fuck, I’m not making myself sound any better. Well, whatever, I hated her anyway, so I couldn’t be bothered to give a shit.

“No, we are _going_ to talk, and if you don’t talk back, you’re going to _listen_ ,” she demanded, folding her arms over her chest and glaring daggers at me.

I snorted, turning away from her. “Yeah, fuck that,” I said simply, walking down the sidewalk in the direction of my dorm room.

“Wait!” she called out, grabbing my sleeve and digging her half-inch long nails into my arm. I hissed, and pulled away again, but, before I could say anything, she said earnestly, “Just hear me out! I have a proposition!”

I narrowed my eyes at her. “And what would that be?”

“I think you should ask my friend on a date.”

I blinked at her, before rolling my eyes, and turning away again. “Yeah, there’s a 100% chance that that _isn’t_ going to happen, so --”

“No, wait, hang on!” she corrected herself again. “It doesn’t even have to be a date!”

That stopped me in my tracks. She was asking for me to engage in a . . . _casual_ relationship? I had never had a girl ask me to have a casual relationship for their friend before. Well, correction, I had never had a girl ask me to ask her friend to have a casual relationship with me. It was such a fucking bizarre request, that there was a part of me so shocked by her presumptuousness, that I pretty much had to ask if she was fucking serious.

I figured I’d catch her off guard by being as blunt as possible, so I said, “You want me to have sex with your friend?”

She nodded determinedly, but her face didn’t break it’s desperate scowl. “I’m pretty sure that’s what I just said.”

I let out an irritated breath, and rolled my eyes. “Well, that’s not going to happen. And I’m not even sorry.”

Bitch took a step towards me, so I compensated by taking a step away. “There are _so_ many things that are wrong with you,” she said, her voice filled with valley-girl exasperation, folding her arms over her chest and popping a hip out “But I’m not doing this for _me_. It’s just that . . . well, you sort of remind me of . . .” She looked dramatically off into the distance, a move that was most likely intentional, before saying, “My friend dated this guy in high school that was exactly like you. Handsome, mysterious, closed off to the world around him, a big _jerk_ \--”

I looked away awkwardly. That was probably one of the most uncomfortable conversations I’d ever had in my life. “Yeah, well, him and I are different people. I haven’t even met your friend, and I have no desire to meet your friend. So you can forget about it.”

“You don’t have to like her!” she said, her voice teetering on desperate. “Just . . . she was just dumped by this _other_ jerk, and she needs a rebound, it doesn’t have to be serious --”

I rolled my eyes and groaned. “Jesus fucking Christ,” I mumbled, turning away again. “I’m surprisingly not _enough_ of a dick to use a chick like that, especially after she just got dumped. She doesn’t need a fuck buddy, especially not _me_. So, the answer is _no_ , and I won’t say it again.”

I walked away before she could say anything else, and my mind was filled with bewildered thoughts the whole walk back.

* * *

Apparently my conversation with The Bitch, mixed in with my bullshit environmental science class, took more out of me than I was expecting, because by the time I made it to the third floor of my dorm room building, I was fucking done with everything. With a sigh, I pulled my keys from my pocket and unlocked the door to my dorm room, sluggishly walking inside, and shut it behind me. I turned around, and saw something I . . . wasn’t prepared to see.

Tweek’s jean-clad ass was hanging in the air while the majority of his torso was tucked under my bed. He either lost something, or I had just stumbled in on another weird habit of his. I tilted my head, and felt my stomach . . . tingle or some shit when I heard him making those frustrated, high-pitched screeching noises that I was so used to that I almost didn’t recognize that he was making them to begin with. I let myself watch for a few more seconds before I said, “Tweek?” I fought back a chuckle when he jumped at the sound of my voice, smacked his head on the ceiling of my bed, and yelped. “What are you doing?”

He squirmed his way to freedom, and then looked up at me with an expression that was a cross between embarrassment and his usual anxiety. “NGH! I can’t find my iPod, man!”

“. . . So you’re checking under my bed?” I asked in a flat voice, folding my arms over my chest and offering him an unimpressed stare. He couldn’t know that I was completely amused by the whole thing. That would have ruined my whole image.

Tweek blushed, and he averted his eyes. “I think I had a dream last night that I was listening to music and drawing constellations with a red pen. Wherever I was, it was really dark, and in between songs I could hear you snoring somewhere above me, so I figured I’d been laying under your bed in my dream. But when I woke up, my iPod wasn’t in my backpack where I left it, and there was a red pen on my bedside table, and a drawing of stars folded into a paper hat was on my head.”

So . . . that answered that question from that morning, but I’m pretty sure Tweek’s explanation should’ve creeped me out, thinking that Tweek unknowingly, or knowingly and forgot, spent a night underneath where I was sleeping. But, the truth is, I was too busy being amused to really care. “Really, Tweek? Under my bed?”

I couldn’t maintain the flatness in my voice, and I started chuckling halfway through my question. When he realized I wasn’t really angry with him, he grinned at me, and, before I could stop it, I found myself smiling back. The weird part about it all was that I wasn’t even annoyed with myself for showing him that side of me that was always underneath the standard Tucker stoicism. I was . . . happy. Really happy.

“How was your day?” Tweek asked, before ducking under my bed again to continue his search, now that he knew I wasn’t totally weirded out by it.

I shrugged, even though I knew he couldn’t see me, and said, “It sucked total balls, but that’s okay.”

“GAH! Why did it suck balls?” Tweek asked, his voice muffled.

“I don’t know, it just sort of . . . did,” I said awkwardly. I didn’t really know how to word it. Like, I knew what happened, but I didn’t know how to tell him that I was -- _again_ \-- confronted by The Bitch after environmental science. It was a weird thing to bring up. Especially because I knew he was actually kind of scared of her, even though he was pretty much 1000x better than her.

I heard a small laugh from underneath my bed, followed by an amused, “Care to expand on that at all?”

I shrugged again. “It’s just . . . well, you remember that bitch that called you a spaz that one time?”

There was a pause. “NGH! GAH! There are many bitches that call me a spaz all the time --”

“Yeah, but I mean the bitch that I yelled at.”

Another pause. “The one that wanted to date you?”

Okay, so that was a bit of a weird detail to remember from that situation, but I let it slide and said, “Yeah, that one. I had another run-in with her today.”

“Oh?”

Tweek’s voice was . . . weird? Like, he was speaking slowly and carefully, and I wasn’t sure why. Seriously, what I wouldn’t have given to see his face in that moment. His voice was expressive, sure, but he was shit at hiding any of his emotions on his face.

“Yeah, and it sucked.”

“You . . .” Pause. “You wanna talk about it?”

I thought about it for a few seconds, before nodding again. “Yeah. I think she hates me.”

Tweek snorted, shifting down slightly so he could reach further. He was _really_ taking his time looking. “Well, you called her a bitch, dude.”

“She was being a bitch,” I said dismissively, before sighing. “I don’t know, she was just giving me a hard time. It wasn’t that big a deal, really, it was just really fucking obnoxious.”

Tweek hummed thoughtfully, and awkwardly squirmed his way out from under my bed. His face was actually relaxed and contemplative, as he looked at his hands. “Does she still want to date you?” he asked in a fairly emotionless, (for Tweek, anyway), voice.

I eyed him strangely. He seemed pretty hung up on the fact that the bitch had, at one point, wanted the rare privilege of climbing into my pants. (I say privilege only because nobody had ever been there before. I’m not _that_ much of an egotistical dick.) I mean, she clearly wanted nothing to do with me, which was just fine, but she apparently thought I’d be good for her friend, (or at least a good _fuck_ for her friend), so I just told Tweek, “No way. She hates me just as much as I hate her.” I shrugged. “But I don’t really give a fuck either way.”

This weird little smile came to Tweek’s face, but he hid it away by ducking his head and shoulders under my bed again. I could tell that little shit wasn’t even looking for his iPod anymore, because he was just . . . under there, not moving. Jesus, he was the weirdest person I’d ever met in my entire life.

“She just went on this long rant about how I remind her of this one guy from her home town,” I continued, crossing the room and sitting on Tweek’s bed, seeing as my own was occupied. Well, _underneath_ it was, but it would’ve been weird if I sat on my own bed. It would’ve felt like I was . . . sitting on him, or something. “I guess she has a friend that was just dumped, and needs a rebound, and Bitch thought it’d be a good idea to use _me_. She wanted me to . . . ” I cleared my throat uncomfortably. “ _You know_. With her friend. To try and get over the breakup.”

There was a beat of silence, before Tweek yelped suddenly and his entire body jolted, causing his head to knock onto the ceiling of my bed frame. Again. He scrambled out -- _again_ \-- and exclaimed loudly, staring at me with blown-open eyes, “ _Jesus Christ, she wants you to have_ sex _with her?!_ ”

Before I had a chance to address his sudden freak out, there was a knock at the door. I glanced away from him and his deer-in-the-headlights expression to glare at whoever was on the other side of the heavy wooden door. It was probably the worst timing in existence; Tweek was on the verge of a freak out, (for reasons I had yet to determine), and we were in the middle of an actually important conversation, instead of our usual bickering.

I hopped to my feet, walked over to the door, leaned against it, and said, loud enough for the person on the other side to hear me, “Who is it?”

“It’s Kenny!”

“And _Butters_!” a second, goofier voice called back in a sickeningly cheerful tone.

I rolled my eyes. They weren’t important enough to interrupt the conversation. “Yeah, well . . .” I called back halfheartedly. “Now’s not a good time.”

I heard Kenny laugh, and say, “Put your damn clothes on and open the door.”

Tweek cleared his throat, so I averted my attention back to him, and he looked considerably more calm. Still a little unnerved and freaked out, but more relaxed than he had been before. “GAH! NGH! It’s fine, you can let them in.”

That took me by complete surprise, like most things that left Tweek’s mouth did. I raised an eyebrow at him. “Are you sure?”

He gave me a tiny, almost unnoticeable smile, and said, “Yeah. It’s just Kenny and Butters.”

I looked at the floor and narrowed my eyes. _Just Kenny and Butters?_ I mean, in the long run I guess they were better than Cartman and Kyle, or Stan and Wendy, or Clyde on his own, but they still weren’t _that_ much better. Sure, I guess it was pretty hard to hate Butters; he was too invested in other people’s happiness, but Kenny was just . . .

A dick. A complete and utter meddling dick. Better than the other assholes in the Asshole Quartet, but seriously, not by much.

But I took Tweek’s word for it. He seemed better, and I didn’t want to lock him away from the outside world, because I knew forming friendships with other people would be good for him. Even if it were those assholes.

I opened the door, an action I pretty much immediately regretted doing. Kenny had an arm wrapped around Butters’ waist, and they both grinned at me when we made eye contact. I had to admit, they both looked pretty happy together. They weren’t a couple I would’ve consciously matched, but they did seem to make each other happy, so good for fucking them.

“What do you guys want?” I asked in a flat voice, backing up and letting them into the dorm room. I closed the door behind them.

“We just came to say hi --”

“Bullshit,” I said, folding my arms over my chest and leaning against the dorm room door. “Every time someone comes to ‘just say hi’, they always want something. So what do you want?”

“Ol’ Ken and I are going for an early dinner,” Butters said, gesturing with his head to Kenny who nodded in agreement. “He thought y-you fellas might wanna tag along, too.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Why us?”

“Because you two are our friends who are whiter than Butters’ dance moves and need sunlight,” Kenny said, smiling innocently. “And everybody else is busy.”

I guess it was sound enough reasoning. I figured I’d leave it for Tweek to decide; I honestly didn’t care either way, and it was up for Tweek to determine whether or not he could tolerate other people that afternoon. I relayed this by catching Tweek’s eye, and shrugging.

He seemed to get the hint, but hid his face when Kenny and Butters got the hint, too, and turned their attention to him. “GAH! NGH! Uh . . . okay . . .” he stuttered, and, even though I couldn’t see his expression, I could just imagine him gnawing the shit out of his bottom lip.

“ _Whoopee_!” Butters cheered happily, beaming at Tweek. “My first afternoon out with Ken, and my old pal Craig, and my new friend, Tweek! L-let’s go to Olive Garden!”

Kenny laughed fondly, wrapping an arm around Butters’ waist. “Sounds good to me. That okay with you guys?”

Because I seriously did not give a single fuck, I shrugged carelessly, but Tweek “GAH!”’d, his posture stiffening nervously, but, before he could even ask, I rolled my eyes and spoke over him. “Yes, Tweek. There’s coffee there.”

Tweek immediately relaxed, letting out a slow breath, and he nodded. “GAH! Okay, then.”

* * *

The dinner/lunch thing that Tweek and I had with Butters and Kenny actually . . . wasn’t that bad. It was kind of _fun_. I had to give it to them: Butters and Kenny were a much less obnoxious couple than I thought they were going to be. The way Kenny talked about Butters when Butters wasn’t around made me think that they were going to be one of those obsessively hands-on couples, like Kyle and Cartman, and Stan and Wendy, (and the dinner that we had all gone to before the party the weekend before really made it seem like they were going to be), but they . . . weren’t. I mean, Kenny had an arm around Butters when they weren't eating, but they weren’t so wrapped up in each other that they couldn’t hang out. And they didn’t even bring up Tweek and I ‘looking good’ as a couple.

It wasn’t until the four of us were sitting in my dorm room, (Butters and Kenny on Tweek’s bed, and Tweek and I on mine), that their asshole-iness return.

“So,” Kenny said, a dangerous smirk coming to his face. I instantly knew that whatever he had to say was going to piss me off, and I narrowed my eyes at him warningly when he caught my eye. “Who is this girl I hear that wants to have sex with you, Craig?”

I raised an eyebrow. “What are you talking about?” I had actually forgotten all about The Bitch since the four of us had started hanging out.

Kenny laughed. “We heard Tweek before I knocked on your door.”

Tweek “GAH!”’d loudly beside me, and exclaimed, “Oh, Jesus, you _heard_ that?!”

Butters laughed quietly behind his hand, and said, “Gee, Tweek, you just about screamed it!”

“Yeah, I’m surprised the entire floor didn’t hear you,” Kenny added, letting out a few amused chuckles. “You seemed really freaked, Tweek, was it someone gross?”

I glanced at Tweek, and I’m not joking when I say he looked beside himself with anxiety. The last time I had seen him that bad was when he came out to me. I sighed, clapping a hand onto his opposite shoulder, so that I gave the (unfortunate) illusion of me having my arm around him. It just seemed like he needed more reassurance than just a shoulder pat, which was all I normally gave him. “Tweek, it’s fine, you don’t have to answer him. It’s not important. If I knew it would bother you this much, I wouldn’t have even told you to begin with.”

To be honest, I had no idea why he was freaking out so much about the fact that _one_ chick at our entire college inquired about a casual relationship, for the simple reason that I looked like her friend’s ex, but he was a weird guy, so I just let him have his oddities, and tried to help him when I could.

“GAH! NGH! EHH! No!” he exclaimed, his face beet red and his body trembling nervously. “No, it’s fine, I swear!”

I sighed. “Are you sure?”

He nodded wildly, but didn’t say anything.

“Okay,” I said, conceding. Truthfully, I didn’t think he was sure, but he was trying, so I decided to trust him. “Some bitch that I hate with the burning passion of a thousand suns told me today she wants me to have sex with her friend because I apparently look like her friend’s ex boyfriend.”

There was a beat of silence, in which Butters and Kenny exchanged glances, before they both erupted into hysterical laughter, leaning onto each other and the table in front of them for support. I rolled my eyes, and looked to see how Tweek was doing. He actually looked better; seeing other people react like that to the same thing he reacted so negatively to probably put things into perspective for him.

“Yeah, it’s fucking hilarious,” I said in my monotone voice, shifting on my lumpy mattress.

Finally, after what felt like for-fucking-ever, Kenny and Butters managed to calm themselves down enough to speak, and, shocker fucking shocker, Kenny spoke first. “Oh, Jesus . . .” he said, his voice high-pitched and lined with laughter. “What are you gonna do about it?”

I raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean ‘what am I going to do about it?’”

“ _A-Are_ you gonna knock boots with her?” Butters asked, wiping a tear from his eye.

I snorted. “No fucking way. What part of ‘bitch that I hate with the burning passion of a thousand suns’ didn’t you understand?”

“Yeah, but you’re not fucking _her_ \--”

“I’ve never met her friend,” I added blankly. “I don’t even know if I would like her. Probably not, if she associates with people like The Bitch.”

“You don’t have to like someone to fuck them,” Kenny observed, his voice having fallen into it’s normal pitch. “And . . . you _did_ say there was passion involved somewhere in there --”

I glared at him steadily. “The Bitch made fun of Tweek, and insinuated that I was too good to be his best friend,” I said, my voice purposefully void of any emotion. “She called him a spaz, and addressed him, to his face, as ‘Tweek the Freak.’ Anyone who would willingly be friends with someone like that is a bitch by proxy. There’s no fucking way I’m going to intentionally subject myself to her company.”

“Ah, so this _is_ about Tweek,” Kenny said, his voice suspiciously nonchalant. “I should’ve known.”

“Man, a-are you _sure_ you two aren’t boyfriend and boyfriend?” Butters asked, glancing between Tweek and I thoughtfully. “ _Really_ sure?”

I turned my glare to Butters. “Yes, I’m really sure.”

“W-well I think you should be,” Butters said with a determined nod.

“There’s lots of people who think we should be,” I said, avoiding everybody’s eyes. “But I’m not gay.”

I felt the bed bounce slightly when Tweek straightened his posture, and he exclaimed loudly, “GAH! NGH! I’m not, either!”

I’m pretty sure I dissociated from my body at Tweek’s sudden announcement. I hated that he felt like he couldn’t tell people. I wanted Tweek to be happy, but the extremely stressed expression on his face, (the creases around his wide eyes, his slightly gaping mouth, the way his body was trembling horrifically), brought me back to that night he first came out to me. It was heartbreaking then, and it was heartbreaking all over again.

Kenny snorted, seemingly oblivious to Tweek’s panic. “Okay, so first of all, Craig, I didn’t say anything when Cartman talked about it the first time, but he’s totally fucking right. My gaydar is off the charts whenever I even look at you.”

“M-mine, too,” Butters agreed.

“And, Tweek,” Kenny continued, turning his gaze away from me. The sarcasm in his expression dropped, and his blue eyes were actually sincere, and kind, and patient, and he said in this calming voice, “It’s okay, you know, if you _are_ gay. Butters and I won’t tell anyone, if you don’t want us to.”

Tweek stared back, his eyes wide and calculating, like he was trying to determine whether Butters and Kenny could be trusted. But the thing is, he was only looking at Kenny. Not Butters, whose warm smile matched Kenny’s to the t. No, instead Tweek’s attention was honed in on _Kenny_.

I frowned.

Tweek finally spoke after a long stretch of silence, but all he said was a mumbled, “But . . .” before his voice trailed off again.

“Tweek, Butters and I are gay,” Kenny said, wrapping an arm around Butters’ shoulders. “Really, really fucking gay.”

“The gayest,” Butter agreed.

“The _total_ fucking gayest,” Kenny continued. “You can trust us. We know what it’s like, and we don’t want that for you. We can help --”

“And C-Craig’s your best friend,” Butters said. “I-it’s not like _he’s_ gonna do anything.”

Tweek hesitated again, before sputtering out, “Uh . . .” He trailed off again, and his head jerked almost violently to the side. His eyes flicked to me, wide and clearly searching for some answers, or at least basic reassurance. I knew exactly what he was looking for, so I leaned towards him, turning my face enough away so that Kenny and Butters couldn’t see my lips, and whispered in his ear,

“Don’t look at me, Tweek, it’s completely up to you if you want to say anything. If you don’t, then don’t. I’ll kick their asses out of our dorm room, and we won’t ever have to talk about it until you’re ready.”

I started to pull back, having said my part, but before I could get far, Tweek seized my head, held me in place, and, resting his cheek harshly against mine, hissed in my ear, “ _I don’t know what to do!_ ”

I allowed Tweek to keep me still, his trembling hands still clutching at my head, and I smiled, even though I knew he couldn’t see me, and whispered back, “Do you trust them?”

There was a long pause, and I was beginning to appreciate the fact that Kenny and Butters seemed to respect that we were having a private conversation, and didn’t interrupt, or even make much noise.

As I waited for a response, I relaxed into the semi-silence. It was . . . kind of comforting, actually. I didn’t really think much of our position at the time; it was only a few seconds into the whole ordeal that I noticed the fact that Tweek’s entire body was vibrating, and it took only a couple more seconds after that to realize that I was practically _flush_ with another guy. That wasn’t exactly the most . . . _normal_ thing for someone like me to do. But I ignored my mild discomfort, because Tweek was freaking out, and whenever Tweek started freaking out, my first priority, without fail, was to stop him from freaking out, even if it meant being -- _literally_ \-- cheek to cheek with him. I rested a hand absently on Tweek’s back, trying to hold him still, (he was fucking _vibrating_ ), and he was completely void of a coherent response for a few seconds before he whispered back,

“I . . . I think so . . .”

I rubbed circles into his back as I felt him start to, albeit very slowly, calm down, and I whispered, “Do you trust them enough with something like this?”

“They, uh . . .” I guess Tweek was trying really hard not to make any of his “GAH!” noises, because he paused in his response to let out an _extremely_ shaky breath right into my ear. My breath caught in my throat at the feeling of it, and my hand halted in place. I had never felt anything like that before; not many people had made it close enough to me to be able to _breath in my fucking ear_. I mean, it was just breath; people breathed all the time, (fuck, I was breathing throughout the entire situation, and I’m currently breathing now), but there was something strange about that _particular_ breath. It was warm, and, even after it had dissipated, I still felt the tingling feeling that it left behind.

I had to try really fucking hard to focus on Tweek’s words after that.

“Kenny and Butters, will they . . . would they tell anyone?”

I blinked a few times, my hand resuming it’s movement, and whispered after a pause, “No. If they say they won’t, then they won’t. Back when we were kids, Kenny _might’ve_ , but he’s changed a lot since then. If he even tried, something tells me that Butters would have his balls in a basket.”

Tweek let out another breath, though this one was clearly a more relieved, calmed sort of laugh than anything else, but it still did the trick, and I felt a clanging in the pit of my stomach at the warm air. I lifted my hands from him, grabbed his hands and removed them from my head, and leaned back, tugging on the strings of my chullo to try to hide some of the blush that I knew was on my face, but also to give my hands something to do. I avoided everybody’s eyes, trying to collect the few pieces of myself that Tweek had somehow chipped away by fucking _breathing_ on me.

I’ll admit, that moment was . . . jarring to say the least. Down south was stirring, and the more I thought about it, the more I realized that I had no desire to keep thinking about it at all. I chewed on my bottom lip, (something I had only started doing once I started hanging out with Tweek for extremely extended periods of time), and quirked my eyebrows, trying to force my thoughts elsewhere.

The room was very quiet, and, when it didn’t seem like anyone was going to say anything, I glanced over at Tweek, who was staring at me, a wide-eyed, and yet still thoughtful expression on his face. I raised an eyebrow after I caught his eye, and watched curiously as he stared back unblinkingly. I could fucking see the cogs turning in his head; he was thinking so hard, I was pretty sure I could smell burning exhaust of relentlessly pumping machinery, but I just let him think it through. Thank fuck Kenny and Butters were still sitting on Tweek’s bed quietly, but they were only a passing thought of mine. I was still entirely focused on Tweek’s decision, which finally came in the form of him slowly nodding, a worried quirk to his eyebrows and his lips twitching.

With his eyes still fixed on me, he mumbled shakily, “I know Craig’s not going to do anything . . .” Tweek swallowed, and I didn’t dare look away for fear of breaking his bravery streak. “He, uh . . . ‘cause he sort of . . . already knows . . .” I couldn’t believe Kenny and Butters even heard Tweek, but they clearly did, as I heard them both hum collectively. I didn’t see their face, though, because I was still sucked into Tweek’s extremely penetrating gaze.

“Aw, I’m real happy for you, Tweek!” Butters cheered loudly, making Tweek jump, consequently breaking our eye contact.

“Yeah, welcome to the family!” Kenny added happily, beaming proudly and resting his head against Butters’.

Tweek looked beside himself with confusion and surprise. “Uh . . . GAH! Oh . . . thanks . . .”

“Is this a new development?” Kenny asked.

I watched as Tweek glanced at me out of the corner of his eye, before staring down at his hands. “GAH! NGH! No, not really . . .”

Butters laughed. “Aw, Tweek, you don’t gotta be all nervous,” he said happily. “From one gay to another, I’m real proud of ya!”

“Yeah, and if someone messes with you, you always have your boyfriend, Craig, to protect you,” Kenny said, shooting me an obnoxious smirk.

I frowned at him, but, before I could answer, he rolled his eyes and added,

“ _Again_.”

I opened my mouth with the intent to call him an asshole, but Butter’s spoke before me, his voice laced with confusion. “A-again?”

“Yeah,” Kenny said with a nod. “You see the bruise on Tweek’s face?”

Butters’ eyes swept over Tweek’s face. He _must’ve_ noticed Tweek’s bruise already, (after all, you really couldn’t miss it), but Butters was too polite to ask about it. Well, he was also the mothering type, so maybe he _would’ve_ if he wasn’t too wrapped up in the fact that he was around Kenny again. “Yeah?”

“He got beat up by these four guys the other day.”

Butters gasped, his eyes widening as he gave Tweek a worried, almost motherly look. “A-are you okay?”

Tweek looked slightly confused that so much concern was being aimed in his direction, but, nevertheless, he nodded wordlessly in response.

Kenny continued, “Yeah, and do you see the bruise on Craig’s fist?”

Butters’ eyes flicked to my hand, which was lying lifelessly in my lap, and he hesitated, before nodding slowly. “Yeah . . .”

“Can you guess how he got it?”

An instant scowl came to Butters’ face, an angry expression I’d never seen on him before souring his normally kind, energetic features. He narrowed his eyes accusingly at me, and bit harshly, “ _Craig_ -”

I knew immediately what he was getting at, and, I had to say, I was pretty fucking sick of defending myself like that. I huffed, folding my arms over my chest. “Why the hell do people keep thinking _I_ did it?”

Butters’ face didn’t lose it’s rage, and he said back, in his shaky voice, “W-well, you got in lots of fight in South Park -”

“Yeah, but Tweek’s my best friend, why would I punch _him_? I actually beat up the guys who were beating Tweek up. I would never hit _him_.”

“Wait just a gosh darn second,” Butters said, frowning. Some his angry had went away, but there was still an accusing quality in his stare. “You beat up _four_ guys?” His voice was patronizingly suspicious, like my story was too absurd to be true.

I didn’t know if I should feel proud that people were so shocked, or offended that people were so shocked, but, either way, I just wanted the conversation to end. “Yes, I did. I don’t understand why people keep thinking I’m lying about shit like this. I give so little fucks; I have lost reason to lie about anything.”

“Yes, Craig, and that’s why we all love you,” Kenny said, smirking. “Now, can you stop being all grumpy and shit? Your best friend is one step closer to being completely out! You should be excited, right?”

I glanced at the blushing face of Tweek. “I don’t know if I’m _excited_ , really, but I am proud of him.”

Tweek groaned, and dropped his head into his hands. I got where he was coming from; he wasn’t used to all this positive energy being spent on him, and it was quite obviously making him uncomfortable, but I still wanted him to know that he wasn’t alone in all of that. He needed positive reinforcement, so that he could finally achieve openly-homo status. But, still, I understood his discomfort, and was prepared to abandon the mushy, heart-to-heart conversation. “GAH! NGH! EHH! Can we _please_ change the subject?”

I smiled at him, a warmth spreading through my chest as I caught just a fraction of his face in profile, and saw that his skin was fucking scarlet. “Sure, Tweek. We can change the subject.”

“Yeah, let’s change the subject.” Kenny’s voice was laced with laughter, and, when I looked over to him, he was staring at me with an amused twinkle in his eyes. “So, Craig. It’s your turn.”

And just like that, the smile was wiped clean from my face and I frowned. “If I have to say this one more time, I’m probably going to tear someone's tonsils out through their mouths.”

Kenny rolled his eyes. “Look, I called Kyle and Cartman _way_ before they happened, I saw Red and Heidi a _mile_ away --”

“Wait a second, my cousin’s a lesbian?” I interrupted incredulously. My brain short circuited at that. Sure, it’d been years since I’d talked to Red at all. Her and I had never been all that close, but I felt like I _should’ve_ known that she wasn’t straight. That just . . . _seemed_ like something that family should know about, even if that family wasn’t all that open with each other. It kinda made me feel like a bad cousin.

Kenny blinked, and then rolled his eyes. “She’s bisexual. You didn’t know that?”

I frowned at him, not pleased by his condescending response. “No, I didn’t fucking know that, why doesn't anybody tell me anything?”

“Y-you can be a real sour pus, Craig,” Butters answered. “You always got this angry look on your face. I used to be awful scared of ya.”

That caught me by surprise, because I always thought that Butters was too into people to really be afraid of any of them. Except for his parents, but that’s a different story. But not only that, I was under the impression, for the entire time that I’d existed in South Park, that I was just some kid that lived there that was constantly annoyed by everyone. I figured they all knew me too well to be even remotely scared of me. I didn’t exactly know how to feel about it. If it were anyone else but Butters, I probably would’ve felt somewhat proud, but I didn’t like knowing that I used to scare someone so . . . trusting and nice. Butters really was on this whole other level of humanity, one that was impervious to hatred, and it was weird knowing that my existence, (because I never really changed at fucking all throughout the entire time I lived in South Park, thus making him afraid of my _personality_ ), was enough to scare him. “I used to scare you?”

Butters nodded, sitting up straight and knocking his knuckles together. “Yeah, a whole lot, too.”

I glanced at Kenny, but his face betrayed shit, so I asked, “Why?”

“Aw, geez, I don’t know if you’d want me to say it out loud,” Butters said sheepishly, looking down at his hands.

I leaned against the wall and folded my arms over my chest. “Well, seeing as I have no idea what you’re talking about, I wouldn’t worry.”

“I-I’m talking about . . .” Butters leaned forward, like that would somehow make it so only I could hear him, (even though we were on opposite ends of the dorm room), and he stage-whispered, “ _Laser eyes._ ”

My eyebrows quirked in confusion. “Laser eyes . . .” I mumbled under my breath, thinking back to all my time in South Park that involved laser eyes. I couldn’t think of a single instance; the only time my laser eyes acted up was when I was in Peru, and I was under the impression that only the Asshole Quartet knew about it. I was also under the impression that it was isolated incident. “When did that happen?”

“O-oh, you . . . you don’t remember?” Butters asked, knocked his knuckles together again.

I shook my head.

“W-well, yeah, I guess maybe you wouldn’t,” Butters continued absently. “Ken, you remember, right?”

Kenny nodded. “Stan’s birthday party, fifth grade?”

“M-midnight,” Butters agreed.

I looked between the two of them, waiting for them to continue, but they didn’t say anything after that, so I frowned and said, “What happened?”

“O-oh!” Butters exclaimed, jerking his attention back to me. “U-uh, you remember Stan’s birthday party in fifth grade, right?”

I nodded impatiently. “Yes, I remember, I was there.”

Butters didn’t respond to my irritation, instead saying, “W-well, it was about midnight, and you were the first one to fall asleep. We were all gonna draw weiners on your face -- i-it was _Clyde’s_ idea, I promise -- but then you just sat up out of nowhere . . . We all thought you woke up, but y-you just stared at the couch and these lasers came shooting out of your eyes! Man, it was wild! You didn’t even wake up, you just laid back down and started snoring!”

I tilted my head thoughtfully. I wasn’t particularly affected by the whole thing. Probably the most startling part about that whole story was learning that I snore. I had lost almost all ability to be surprised because of how much time I’d spent in South Park, but I was a little interested to know that I didn’t have to be in Peru to initiate laser-eye mode. “Oh.”

“Dude, you lit a pillow on fire,” Kenny said, raising his eyebrows at me. “Butters was freaking out.”

I hummed, straining my memory to see if any of those events would make sense in my mental timeline of my life, but I just couldn’t make the connection. I couldn’t even remember them telling me about it the morning after.

“Uh -- GAH! NGH! -- would someone like to tell me what the _fuck_ you guys are talking about?!” Tweek exclaimed hysterically, and, when I looked at him, his eyes were wide in panic, his shoulders hunched over into himself.

I blinked. Tweek was so much like the guys from South Park, (meaning he fit in so _well_ ), that I momentarily forgot that we didn’t actually grow up together. He had every fucking right to be confused as fuck, so I decided to fill him in on the whole situation in as simple and to-the-point terms as I could. “I told you about the time those assholes stole my birthday money, right?”

I heard Kenny scoff, but Tweek nodded, so I continued.

“Well, when we were in Peru, it turns out that I . . .” I averted my eyes thoughtfully. “Um . . . hmm . . . it’s a little hard to explain  --”

“Craig’s king of the guinea pigs and can shoot lasers out of his eyes,” Kenny interrupted bluntly.

Tweek looked torn as to whether to believe him, so I said, “He’s not joking, Tweek. Just . . . don’t think about it too much, and it’ll start to make sense. That’s what I did.”

“GAH! King of the guinea pigs . . .” Tweek mumbled, his voice full of childlike awe.

“ _A-and_ laser eyes,” Butters tacked on, ‘helpfully’.

“No wonder your eyes are so blue . . .” Tweek said, his tone thoughtful and shaky. “They’re full of electricity.”

I blinked at that. I didn’t think he noticed the color of my eyes. Though I shouldn’t have been surprised, he did seem to enjoy picking up small little details about people’s appearances. I’d known that for a while, and, because him and I were pretty always together, I probably would’ve been surprised if he didn’t know what color eyes I had. “I guess so. Maybe.”

“Just . . . you can _seriously_ shoot fucking lasers out of your eyes?” Tweek said, his voice accusing, like he didn’t believe me, (which, logically, he wouldn’t). “Like _actual_ lasers?”

I shrugged uncomfortably. “I mean, yeah. I haven’t done it in awhile though.”

I observed Tweek’s reaction, and it was more or less what I was expecting. He looked beside himself with some emotion that I’m pretty sure not even he could pinpoint. He just looked beyond confused, and his confusion made him twitch even more, and it was actually fucking hilarious the more I watched him.

“Can I . . .” Tweek chewed on his lip for a second, before suffering a massive twitch and exclaiming, “GAH! Can I . . . see?”

I raised an eyebrow. “You want to see me shoot lasers out of my eyes?” I asked blankly.

He nodded shyly, as if the absurdity of his request was just catching up with him.

I furrowed my eyebrows thoughtfully. “I haven’t done it in awhile, Tweek, I don’t even know how to.”

“Just try?” Tweek said meekly, hugging his arms to his stomach. “Please?”

Something in me melted at his tone, and I felt my cheeks heat up. He was staring at me from under his eyelashes, his face pink and relaxed in his curiosity, and I really really fucking enjoyed the attention. It reminded me somewhat of the brief arousal that he had inspired from, like, fifteen minutes from before. I looked away immediately at the recent memory, having no desire to repeat the thoughts for fear of repeating my unwelcome physiological response. I cleared my throat, tugging on my one of the strings of my chullo in thought. “I can try, I guess . . .” I mumbled, focusing my eyes on the floor. I narrowed them, and tried to will . . . _lasers_ to come shooting out of my eyes, but nothing happened.

Not like I really expected something to happen. It wasn’t exactly something I had _practiced_ , nor did I think I was capable of doing it without provocation.

I was so intent on forcing the sparks to come, that I didn’t realize there was slight commotion in the room until Kenny exclaimed, “Holy shit, Tweek’s got a _massive_ boner!”

My head jerked up, and immediately turned to Tweek, which proved to be a mistake, because at that exact moment, my eyes . . . sizzled? slightly, and this beam came shooting out, pointed directly at Tweek’s lap.

Tweek yelped loudly, jumping to his feet and hurrying away from me, holding both of his hands to his upper right thigh. I closed my eyes hastily, trying to force the heat to go away, which _worked_ actually, but even as they returned to their normal, room-temperature state, I kept them closed, even holding my hands in front of my shut eyelids as an added barrier.

“Shit, fuck, oh god _dammit_ , Tweek, I’m sorry,” I rambled from behind my hands.

I could hear Tweek’s high-pitched “GAH!”’s, and “NGH!”’s, but I didn’t dare lift my head on the off chance that the sparks weren’t finished yet. I heard some muffled laughter coming from the direction of Tweek’s bed, and I bared my teeth when I realized that Kenny -- that fucking asshole -- was trying not to laugh. I also heard Butters saying quickly,

“Aw, Ken, stop laughing, Tweek’s hurt!”

but I was only really focused on Tweek’s continued exclamations of pain that _I_ had caused him.

“Tweek? Are you okay?” I asked, only slightly aware of the fact that my voice was somewhat muffled.

“GAH! NGH! Yeah, I -- AHH! -- I’m fine . . .” Tweek managed out, but the strain in his voice betrayed the fuck out of him.

I steeled myself, trying to convince myself that if I looked up, my eyes would still be their normal blue, and nothing South Park-y was going to happen, but it took a few seconds of intense self-scolding before I slowly lifted my head.

My eyesight was normal. The heat had been gone for a while, and didn’t return as I made eye contact with the wide-eyed Tweek. He was bent over slightly, his hands still pressed to his thigh, like he was trying to hide something. I didn’t feel like I was qualified to comfort Tweek physically, so I burrowed down in my mattress and said, “Tweek, seriously, you don’t look fine --”

“GAH! I am, I swear! I just . . .” his voice trailed off, and his eyebrows furrowed like he was in deep thought. “It’s just... you kinda -- GAH! -- you burned a hole . . . in my jeans . . .” As soon as the words left his mouth, he grimaced, and spun around so that he was facing the wall. He was trembling, still hunched over slightly, and I stared at his back, unbelieving that what had just happened . . . had just happened. I just . . . I wasn’t even in South Park anymore, and I managed to burn a whole in Tweek’s jeans with my fucking eyes.

At this thought, I sucked a breath through my nose. I fucking _burned_ a fucking _hole_ in Tweek’s jeans . . . With my _fucking eyes_. . .

I cleared my throat and, averting my eyes to my hands, said, “Hey, Kenny and Butters? Not to be . . . _rude_ or anything, but now might be a good time to leave.”

Kenny laughed, and I even heard the quiet, stifled chuckles of Butters. “Alright, alright, we know when we’re not wanted,” Kenny said, and I heard two pairs of feet pad softly on the hardwood floor.

“Yeah, come on, Ken, l-let’s go watch Terrance and Phillip,” Butters said, and I listened as their voices passed me and headed towards the door.

“Popcorn and M&M’s?”

“A-and chocolate milk.”

There was more mindless chatter between the two of them as the door opened, and then closed again, leaving Tweek and I alone in our dorm room. There was a long beat of awkward silence, (I’m talking a solid half minute of just listening to Tweek “GAH!” and “NGH!”), before I decided to blurt out,

“Are you . . . okay?”

Tweek was quiet for a moment, before saying, “GAH! Yeah . . . just . . . I’m gonna change my pants . . .”

There was something about the way he said that, (meek, resigned, like it was just a normal thing), that made me smile. It reminded me again of why he seemed so South-Park-like to begin with; he was just so comfortable around the abnormal. I just burned a hole in his fucking _pants_ , and he freaked for like a minute, and then just sighed and decided a change of burnt clothes was necessary. No further explanation.

“My eyes are closed, Tweek, don’t worry,” I answered, putting my hands over my eyes.

There was some rustling, a few pained hisses, (the bruises on Tweek’s torso was still hurting him some, as well as the burn that I was sure was on his thigh), and I kept my hands over my eyes for probably half a minute, before he said,

“GAH! You can look . . . just don’t burn me again . . .”

I took my hands away from my face and rolled my eyes. “Yeah, yeah. That was the first time that that’s happened since apparently fifth grade. I didn’t even know I could do it on command. You don’t have to worry about me . . . _burning_ you again.”

Tweek frowned at me, putting his hands on his hips in a stance I’d never yet seen from him before. Which is saying a lot, because I could probably pick out any emotion on his face, or body, at the drop of a hat. “Yeah, that _hurt,_  you asshole,” he said bitterly, but there was some humor in his eyes that told me he wasn’t totally pissed at me.

But it did make me think. I burned a hole in his jeans. Sure, I’d been thinking that thought on repeat since it happened, but it was only in that moment that I actually realized that the heat from that must’ve actually really fucking stung. Like, to the point that I actually started to worry about him again. “Tweek, are you sure you’re okay? I don’t need to like . . . look at it, or anything, right?”

Yep, those words actually left my fucking mouth. I offered to look at Tweek’s upper thigh, dangerous close to his -- to put it simply -- his _dick_. I had went and pulled a Tweek. I talked without thinking.

And Tweek knew it, too, because he gave me a weird look. “GAH! EHH! Uh . . . no, I’m good --”

“You’re not blistering or anything right?”

“ _No_ , Craig --”

“Because burns can be really serious if they’re not taken care of right --”

“It’s _fine_ , just a little red and hot --”

“You tend to not take care of yourself the right way, though --”

“Craig! My jeans absorbed most of the impact, I’m _fine_ \--”

I sighed. I didn’t believe him, but I’d been kind of bugging him, so I decided to trust what he was telling me. “Promise?”

Tweek looked absolutely exasperated. “Jesus Christ, _yes_!”

I nodded. “Okay, fine. I believe you.” I looked him up and down. He looked exactly the same as before he got changed. Like me, he just had five pairs of the same pants and the same five shirts, so he basically wore the same set every single day. And, like always, he pants were oddly _neat_ compared to the rest of his clothes.

I actually caught myself before I started staring for too long, and asked, “You want to watch Red Racer?”

Tweek nodded, the frustration melting away to contentment. “GAH! Yeah! We’re getting _really_ close to being done!”

I smiled. “About a week more of our usual watching, and we’ll be completely finished.”

Tweek caught my eye and smiled back at me. “Let’s get started, then.”


	13. You Feel Better Than I Ever Imagined

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this taken so long, it's been a loooong month.

My entire life I’ve been terrible at doing nice things for other people.

I mean, I’d slowly been getting better at it the more I spent actual time around actual people, but I was always so awkward about it, and I never knew what to say in the moment. When I had been nice to people before college, I always did it quietly, because it’s just easier that way.

I think probably the nicest thing I ever did for anyone before college, I got no credit for, because I didn’t _want_ any fucking credit for it. Nobody would have believed me even if I did admit to it eventually, because, even though I never _acted_ like a malicious asshole, my reputation that I _guess_ I built for myself, didn’t really include doing selfless things for others.

The ‘good deed’ was for Jimmy, the kid with cerebral palsy that I went to school with. His favorite place in the entire town was the theater, where local plays, (that were mostly shit), and up-and-coming stand-up comics, (that were also mostly shit), happened. But, because South Park was such a shitty town that poured their money into bottomless pits of investments and ignored public opinion, it was left slightly dilapidated and there were no handicapped rails, so it was hard for him to get inside. He complained about it constantly, and it was one of the only things that I didn’t get irritated listening to. Clyde’s complaining was obnoxious, Token didn’t complain, and usually neither did Jimmy. But when he did, people tended to listen.

There was talk about holding fundraisers and shit to raise the money for a more handicap-accessible way to get inside, but it was happening too slowly, and people were losing interest the longer the petition lasted for. And I got really fucking annoyed with the fact that it hadn’t just fucking _happened_ already, so I -- anonymously -- put all my savings into the small pool of money, and it was just enough for a ramp, handrails, larger doors for kids with wheelchairs, and general upkeep.

(If you’re wondering where I got the money, let’s just say that ever since the Asshole Quartet had stolen my $100, I had grown a bit . . . stingy.)

I never told anybody about that. But the more time I spent around Tweek specifically, the more I thought about that one decision of mine, and the _exact_ moment that I decided to help Jimmy at all, which was why, after the party with the assholes from South Park,  I decided to do a . . . good deed.

Perhaps not as good as the deed I had done for Jimmy, but good enough to be considered good.

So, ever since Butters had brought to my attention that Tweek still just walked around with no coat, I’d been tossing around the idea of getting him one, because I knew he wouldn’t get one for himself. If he hadn’t already, than I knew he never would. I had given him my green sweatshirt to temporarily keep so that he wouldn’t freeze what little ass he had off, but in the dead of winter, (which had been fast approaching), a sweatshirt would only go so far.  

So, when it was Tweek’s turn to go grocery shopping, I waited until he left, and then made a beeline to the other end of town. There was this second-hand store that I had walked by a few times before, but I had never had a reason to go inside it. It looked like the sort of store that would sell things that had somewhat-good quality for ridiculously cheap, and it was getting to the time of year for them to have at least a _small_ coat selection. I figured it was a good place to start, and it was only about a fifteen minute walk from my dorm building, so that was pretty good in my book.

The store was called “Carol’s Collectibles,” and I assumed it was run by some old lady that wore flower vests and had long grey hair that was always pulled back in a loose ponytail. I tried to look into the few windows lining the store to see what I was in for, but these ugly-ass lace curtains were in the way, so the best I could do was walk into the elderly warzone and hope for the best.

When I opened the door, a too-loud bell jingled above my head. I nodded curtly to the older lady behind the counter, who’s perfume was strong enough to smell from the door and was strikingly similar to baby powder, before my eyes swept around the store, trying to find the fastest path to any coats that Tweek would like and would also fit him. One side of the store had pretty much everything that you would expect to be crammed into one small old-lady store: kitchenware, superhero figurines, used books, books on tape, VHSs, DVDs, puzzles, greeting cards, office supplies, flowery fabrics, tablecloths, candles, and all sorts of other random shit. I only spared that side a single glance, before looking to the other side of the store, which was full of clothes that ranged from infant onesies, to men’s suits, to a few of those Russian-jacket things that were only fur and went down to your knees. I turned in the direction of those Russian coat things, thinking that that was probably my best bet.

The getting of the coat was the easy part. I knew what Tweek’s tastes were -- green and as unassuming as possible -- so the actual acquisition of the coat wasn’t the problem. It was the _giving it to him_ part, because I was shit at being nice, as I’m sure you already know, and I was probably even more shit at giving a heartfelt gift that hopefully didn’t cost more than twenty dollars.

As I was thinking about the best way to bring up the coat conversation with Tweek, I almost ran into another human, someone who was stacking shoes straight out of the 1950’s onto an empty shoe rack. If it were another old lady, I would’ve apologized, but it was some other guy my age, so I shrugged it off and went to back away without saying a word, when the guy turned around and spoke to me.

“Well, well, well. Craig Fucker. What brings you to Carol’s Collectibles?”

I sighed, not even surprised to find Kenny, with a dinky-looking nametag pinned to his plain black t-shirt. Guess he worked at some shitty second-hand store, as well as Walmart. It made sense; how else would he have paid for an entire apartment, that he bragged about at the party until Cartman threatened to give Kyle an exhibitionist blowjob if he didn’t shut up? I mean, sure, Stan shared it with him, but Kenny was dirt poor in South Park.

I settled an even stare at him. I was getting a little tired of running into him all the time. It was like he was stalking me unconditionally. “Oh. Hey. I’m looking for a coat.”

He gave me a suggestive smile. “Would this happen to be a coat for our very own favorite spaz?”

I shrugged, leaning up against an obnoxiously-placed column inside the store that just happening to be right beside me. “Maybe.”

“Alright, I have to be a part of this,” Kenny said, taking a few steps away to one of those circle racks that was reserved only for coats. “It’s bound to be hilarious, and Carol won’t know I’m slacking off if she thinks you’re a customer.”

I blinked. “I . . . _am_ a customer.”

“Yeah, but you’re also Craig Tucker, and one of my friends, and you’re buying a heartfelt present for another guy. This isn’t working, this is a fucking soap opera moment.” He chuckled, before adding, “I better be around when you give it to him; it _will_ be hilarious.”

I ignored him, and instead asked, “How in the fuck did you get a job here? Old people hate you.”

“See, _that_ is where you’re wrong,” Kenny said, folding his arms over his chest proudly. “Old people love me. All I had to do was charm Carol with my sophisticated wit, and she was putty in my hands.”

I scrunched up my nose. “Gross.”

He rolled his eyes. “Whatever. Hood, or no hood?”

I hummed, accepting the subject change and the fact that I wouldn’t have to do anything besides _think_ for that particular outing. “Hood. His ears will get cold if there isn’t one, and he’ll refuse to get a hat.”

I heard the shifting of coat hangers as Kenny sifted through the small selection. “Okay, uh . . . fur or no fur?”

“Absolute not, no fur.”

Kenny glanced over at me. “Are you sure? He might like it; feel it, it’s soft.”

I gave him a pointed look, ignoring the coat hood he was holding out for me. “Tweek would hate having fur anywhere near his face. There might be pesticides or some trans species, transmittable disease that would kill him slowly the longer he was exposed to it.”

Kenny pursed his lips, looking unsure. “What if it’s fake fur?”

I raised my hands to do the hand quotation thing, and said, “‘You don’t know that.’”

He rolled his eyes. “Right, fine. Hood, no fur. Now, color. Dark blue, or black?”

“Green.”

“Did I say green was an option?”

“Oh, come on, there has to be some plain green coats there.”

“There are a couple, but they’re all XL and XXL.”

I frowned. “Tweek’s an extra small.”

Kenny snorted, shifting the coats around some more. “No fucking way, I never would’ve guessed. So like I said, dark blue or black?”

I sighed deeply. “Dark blue. I guess.”

Kenny shot me a shit eating grin. “But if he wore black, he’d look like a cute little sunflower.”

I gave Kenny a blank look, unimpressed by his gleeful expression. “If Tweek heard you call him cute, he’d punch you on the shoulder and call you an asshole. And I’m serious, grab an extra small, dark blue coat with a hood, and no fur, that also isn’t really fucking expensive.”

He rolled his eyes again. “You _could_ look, too, you know.”

“I don’t need to look. I just need to tell you what to find, and you can find it. That’s what makes good customer service.” I knew that I sounded like an asshole, but that’s only because I was talking to Kenny. I spent six months working at Target in Middle Town when I was seventeen, (to pay my parents back for this fucking sweet telescope that’s sitting in their basement, just waiting for me to return to it), and customer service jobs are the working equivalent of pulling out your molars with a pair of pliers.

Kenny didn’t seem too stoked on my response. “Sometimes I wonder why the fuck Tweek likes you.”

My stomach twinkled or some shit at those words, but I swallowed it down with a blank look. “Yeah, well. Whatever. How much is it?” I asked, when I saw him pull out a coat with the exact description I told him to get.

“Well, fuck me sideways, this one’s only ten bucks. ‘Course that probably means it will fall a part in a year, but it works for now.”

I didn’t answer. I was mostly just content that my brief shopping trip was over with. And finally Tweek would have a coat, and he wouldn’t have to freeze to death every time we left our dorm room. “Good enough. I’m sure he’ll like it.”

Kenny glanced up at me and snorted. “Do you know how gay you sound, or is it completely accidental?”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “Just shut the fuck up and give the me coat, McCormick.”

He laughed, tossing me the coat carelessly and shoving his hands in his pockets. “So, when _are_ you going to give it to him?”

I shrugged, swinging the coat over my arm and making my way to the front of the store. “I don’t know. At some point. I’ll probably tell him about it before I give it to him.”

“Um. Why?”

I shrugged again. “Thought I’d maybe ease him into it. I’ve never given him anything before. He doesn’t seem like the person to just accept presents without warning.”

Kenny clicked his tongue, and I had no idea what that meant, so I kept my eyes forward to avoid finding out. “D’aww,” he said finally, his voice laced with chuckles. I should’ve expected that response, so I narrowed my eyes at some surrogate-target old lady that was slowly observing some used books on this ridiculously tall bookshelf. “That’s so cute! You’re getting your cute boyfriend a spontaneous present. Isn’t the honeymoon phase awesome?”

I huffed, and said, “Stop calling Tweek cute, it’s weird. And speaking of weird, where the fuck is Butters? Shouldn’t he be here giving you discrete blowjobs behind bookshelves and shit?”

“Butters is taking an online class,” Kenny answered fondly, not even acknowledging the fact that I kind of insulted their relationship as a whole. “It’s called advanced arithmetic, I think. He’s a genius. A _certified_ genius; he has an IQ of 153.”

I tilted my lips downwards, impressed. I hadn’t realized Butters was so smart. He was such a dopey guy, and his accent didn’t really suggest anything else, so I just assumed he got by with an IQ of _maybe_ 100\. It put into perspective how underappreciated Butters was with the guys. He was unreasonably nice to people, (he gave his jacket to a fucking _homeless_ guy at a gas station), he was so fucking loyal that he stuck by all his friends even though they totally mistreated him, and he was apparently smarter that Kyle, who I thought was the smartest person in South Park, even as a kid. But I didn’t really have the energy or the desire to voice all that, so I just said simply, “Oh. Cool.”

Kenny scoffed. “Okay, understatement of the year. And I mean, Tweek is great and all, but fuck, my Buttercup is just about the greatest human being that’s ever existed.”

I looked over my shoulder sharply, and immediately almost tripped over a protruding floor board. I stumbled slightly before I caught my balance and, ignoring Kenny’s chuckles at my expense, turned to face him and said, “What do you mean ‘Tweek is great and all’?”

There was a pause, in which a smug smirk crossed Kenny’s face, like he knew something I didn’t. “Oh, nothing. Just I’d probably be interested in him if Butters didn’t exist. I have a type, see, and my type is nice, little blondes that have cute laughs, can’t hold their alcohol, and need to be protected.” Kenny’s smirk grew. “But that’s your type, too, isn’t it?”

I opened my mouth to answer in the negative, when Kenny just talked right fucking over me.

“Oh, who are you kidding, of course it is. In all the years I’ve known you, you haven’t given a single fuck about anybody. You announce it randomly all the time. But then along comes Tweek Tweak, and it’s almost like you --”

I bared my teeth at him, his words evoking a whole bunch of emotions that swirled inside my stomach, and it was so fucking difficult to focus on just one, so I accepted them as a whole. They boiled down to anger, so that’s how I responded. “Kenny, I swear to fucking God, I’m really fucking sick of this. Is it that fucking hard to accept the fact that I have _a_ friend?”

Kenny looked me up and down thoughtfully. “Kind of. But that’s not why I keep pushing this on you. I push it on you because it’s so fucking obvious that you’re confused how you feel about him. And it’s even _more_ obvious that you want to fuck him raw, and I don’t want you to waste any time by just denying it. I’ve got _plenty_ of experience of _that_.”

I shook my head and turned away, intending to just pay for Tweek’s coat and leave before I punched Kenny right in his jugular vein. And I wouldn’t even care if that killed him, because he would’ve deserved it. “Get back to work, McCormick. Wouldn’t want to get caught slacking off.”

* * *

Tweek was in our dorm room by the time I got back, and I immediately felt like a fucking moron when I realized that I was holding Tweek’s coat in a thin plastic bag, in my hand, in plain sight. I wasn’t ready to give it to him yet, as I hadn’t really planned on what I was going to say, so I wracked my brain quickly to try to come up with some excuse, when Tweek bounded over to me and said excitedly,

“GAH! Guess what, Craig?!”

I discreetly hid the bag behind my back, pleased that he was too distracted by something else to notice. “What?”

“Guess who I saw at the grocery store?”

“Who?”

“Those dicks who beat me up!”

I raised an eyebrow, confused as to why Tweek was happy about that, so I voiced my confusion and waited for an answer.

Tweek paced quickly, his feet barely touching the ground with each step. There was a wide smile on his face, his eyes lit up brightly in his excitement. I felt myself smile at the sight of it. “Well, I was scared at first and tried to hide from them, but I accidentally made eye contact with them and they _ran away!_ ”

I barked out a laugh at that. “They ran away? Why?”

“Because they’re scared of me! Or, well, of _you_ , but also of me! By extension!”

I smiled. “That’s great, Tweek.”

“I know!” he exclaimed, running a hand through his wild blonde hair as a less violent version of his normal hair yanking. “I’m so excited! Let’s watch Red Racer!” Tweek voice was faster than it normally was, which is saying a lot, because Tweek always talked like someone had fast forwarded his voice 1.5 times faster than a normal human’s speed. “You set it up, I’ll make the fort!”

Without waiting for an answer, Tweek turned around, and started dragging my mattress off of my bed. I stared at him for a few seconds, slightly amused by how excited he was to be feared by someone for the first time in his life, before turning away. I realized that Tweek was so distracted by both his excitement, and the process of making our fort, that he wouldn’t notice if I tucked the plastic bag into the very back of our closet.

After the fort was made and the tv was prepared for a nice Red Racer binge session, we sat down beside each other, our knees a couple inches from brushing together, and, just before I hit play, my eyes widened. “Dude. Tweek.”

Tweek looked over at him, his face relaxed and his lips twisted into a half smile. “Yeah?”

“We have three more episodes of season fourteen.”

He was silent for a few seconds before saying, “And that means that --”

“We’re going to be on season fifteen in three episodes.”

Another beat of silence. “Oh my God.”

“The end is here, Tweek.”

“Jesus Christ, it went by so fast!”

“This show always flies by, I don’t understand.”

“I can’t even think about it; hit play!”

I turned away from him, and started the episode, my head bobbing to the catchy theme as I allowed myself to be sucked into my childhood.

We were sitting there for fucking _hours_. We had started about about five in the afternoon, took a brief, maybe hour long study break, and at about two in the morning, I think Tweek and I unanimously decided that the episode that had just ended was going to be our last. It was a Wednesday, so if we were going to be somewhat productive, we had to’ve put a stop to it. But the thing is, we were getting so close to the end, it was almost frustrating. We weren’t even halfway through with it yet. It was the very last season, and every episode was like watching the few moments before a car crash that you already knew was going to happen. You just wanted it to fucking _happen_ already.

I leaned back onto my hands as the credits started to play, and sighed happily. “God fucking _dammit_ , I love this show so fucking much.”

“Yeah, dude, it’s a masterpiece that humanity doesn’t deserve.”

I tore my eyes from the credits screen to smile at him. “You can say that again. The amount of time I spent in front of a tv screen instead of doing something productive when I was a kid is almost embarrassing.”

Tweek rolled his eyes, and took a long drink from his coffee. “Craig, I _never_ left my house when I was a kid. I think you’re fine.”

I laughed, and, turning the tv off, I turned my body to face Tweek. I waited until I had his complete and undivided attention, before saying, “Let’s finish the show on Saturday. Let’s clear our schedule, get as many snacks as we can stomach, and just watch straight through.”

The smile on Tweek’s face was enough to light up an entire city. “Jesus fucking Christ, yes!” he said excitedly. “Let’s have popcorn!”

I smiled and nodded. “Popcorn, granola bars, and you can have coffee. I’ll even make it for you. I’ll hang my sweatshirts in front of the window so that the sun can’t come in, we’ll turn off the lights, put our phones on silent, and ignore everybody.” It was basically what we normally did, but I’d decided we should make a special occasion out of it, considering it really was the end of the line. Tweek and I had come so far; we were going to see it to the end with a _bang_.

“That sounds fucking _awesome_ , man!” Tweek exclaimed, setting his coffee delicately on the floor. Or, as delicately as Tweek’s shaking hands would allow him, which was surprisingly delicate, considering it was his coffee that he was at risk of spilling. I expected him to stand up and stretch or something, but instead he launched himself at me, wrapping his arms around my neck and almost knocking me over with his abrupt enthusiasm.

I caught him -- fucking barely -- and, without thinking, wrapped my arms around his tiny body. He was his normal boiling self, the scent of coffee wafting around me like an invisible, still breeze. It took a few seconds for me to realize that we were hugging; it was almost a natural reaction, to have this tiny man encompassed in my arms as tightly as he would let me.

It was . . . nice. Comfortable. Not at all suffocating like I’d always kind of felt physical contact to be. And, as opposed to the last time Tweek and I had been in this position, I was actually capable of smiling, which I did without hesitation when Tweek laughed again. That kind of confused me, because, besides the spontaneous fucking _hug_ , nothing had really happened. “What’s so funny?” I asked him, resting my head against his. I realized fully that I would have to do, like, fifty ‘no homo’s’, or something, but, for the time being, I was fine just where I was.

“It’s so fucking awesome having a best friend, dude,” he said, and I could hear the smile in his voice.

“You’re right. You do have a pretty awesome best friend,” I said, smirking when I heard him scoff.

“You keep telling yourself that.”

“I mean, I don’t know, you’re a pretty good guy, too,” I said, shrugging under Tweek’s arms. “I guess.”

I could just picture Tweek rolling his eyes in my mind, and when he lifted his head, his eyes half-lidded in somehow amusement and exasperation, he said, “Yeah, well, it’s not like you . . . n-not like you have . . . have, u-uh . . . mmm . . .”

I blinked a few times when he trailed off. He caught my eye somewhere when he was talking, and whatever the fuck he was about to say just trickled to a stop, and he just fucking _looked_ at me. I had no idea what to do; I had never seen him freeze up so suddenly before, and nothing had even _happened_. But apparently something _did_ happen, to him at least, because his hold around my neck tightened, which just brought me even closer to him, and his body started to tremble more than it had been before. His mouth slowly shut, and I watched a swallow make it’s way down his throat. I was about to question him about his sudden lapse into a nearly impeccable statue impersonation, but before I could say anything, I dragged my gaze up along his face, and settled on his eyes, which was probably a mistake, because my question didn’t make it past my brain before it crapped out.

All sorts of fucked up thoughts went racing through my mind the longer I looked at him. I felt reality just completely fall away, which sounds fucking retarded now that I’m verbalizing it, but at the time, it made total sense. It was like I was being sucked _into_ Tweek, and I didn’t fucking like it at fucking _all_ , but I couldn’t stop, because Tweek’s eyes were like bottomless pits. And it seemed like I had only just noticed them, and the fact that they were _almost_ the color of coffee that had a fair amount of cream in it, and I remember thinking that that was completely logical because it was _coffee_ , even if Tweek drank his black. But it wasn’t just coffee-brown; there was also this . . . almost reddish color in there somewhere? Of course Tweek had to’ve had the weirdest looking eyes on the entire planet, completely indescribable using normal English words, but they matched his face so perfectly, and I couldn’t imagine him with any other color. In my experience, most people seemed latched onto blue and green eyes, because they have a richer color or something stupid like that, but I had never seen such depth in someone’s eyes like in Tweek Tweak’s.

My heart was racing in my chest, pounding so hard I could pretty much hear it smashing against my ear drums. He was so fucking close to me, I couldn’t see any of him past his chin, just his face, almost -- but not quite -- unbearably close. My hands tensed nervously on the middle of his back, which just brought him even _closer_ , and I could start to feel his breath on my face, which came in rapid puffs because, like always, he was breathing super heavily, and, like earlier that week, when I had  _accidentally_ been caught off guard by Tweek’s warm breath on my ear, it was having a strange effect on me.

I couldn’t decide which of his eyes to focus on, so I let my attention shift from one to the other, and, even though I was theoretically observing the differences between his right eye and his left, nothing really concrete was coming to mind, besides the fact that they were just . . . so fucking _mesmerizing_. . .

The silence was thick, heavy, and humid, and it was broken when Tweek said in a breathless voice, “Craig . . .”

I was instantly caught up in the way he whispered my name, and my heart started beating even faster, which I hadn’t thought was even possible. “Yeah, Tweek?” I breathed back, incapable, of speaking more than a whisper.

Tweek moved his hands -- which were warm, but somehow not sweaty -- away from being hooked around my neck, and instead pressed his palms to my jawline. “You’re cold . . .” I knew he wasn’t talking about my face; my face was flushed and warm and I could feel the heat radiating off of it. No, he was talking about my hands. He could feel my chilled hands even through his misbuttoned, long-sleeved shirt. My hands were always cold; my sister would sometimes call me, specifically, a cold-blooded asshole, simply because they could never stay warm for too long.

So, I didn’t know what to say to Tweek’s muttered observation, but the feeling of his soft hands on my warm face was making just thinking difficult, let alone talking, so the only thing I managed to say was, “I’m always cold . . .”

Tweek’s mouth opened, and then closed again, as if he were unsure of what to say to that, but, before he could say anything, a loud _dinging_ noise from my phone interrupted whatever . . . _thing_ was happening, and there wasn’t even a second of a delay before Tweek and I flung ourselves away from each other. I scrambled off of the mattress, avoiding everything about Tweek, and pulled _hard_ at the handles of my chullo, feeling confusion wash all over my tingling body. I had no idea what the fuck had just happened; all I knew was that it was fucking weird as all fucking fuck, and I didn’t want to dwell on it any further than that.

Another _dinging_ noise reminded me of what drew us apart to begin with, and I turned my attention to my phone, which was sitting on my bedside table. Without looking at Tweek at all, I walked across the mattress and grabbed my phone, seeing on the lock screen that it was from fucking _Kenny_ , of all fucking people. I held my finger over the home button, allowing it to read my fingerprint, and went to my messages.

There were two texts from Kenny. The first one said, _U awake? Might need help, cant find Butters_ , and the second said, _Nvm, found him, he went to get a drink of water and fell asleep on the kitchen floor_

I rolled my eyes, finally gaining control of my breathing enough to be completely exasperated by the entire situation, and the fact that Kenny sent me an extremely vague text that actually sounded kind of interesting, but then didn’t elaborate. Not like I could’ve really focused on someone else’s problems too intently, anyway.  

I was interrupted from my musings by a few anxious “GAH!”’s from Tweek’s direction, and I was instantly reminded of just what the fuck had transpired, like, ten seconds before. It was probably the gayest moment of my entire fucking life, and my entire being, from my soul to my toes, just wanted to _forget_ it ever happened.

“We should go to sleep, shouldn’t we?” I said, my voice _slightly_ shaky, (and I meant fucking _slightly_ , you would’ve had to know me for a long fucking time to notice it), but otherwise back in it’s normal monotone. I rubbed the back of my neck, keeping my eyes fixed to my feet.

“GAH! NGH! Yeah, we should!” Tweek exclaimed, his voice a roller coaster of anxiety. He sounded so horrifically anxious -- more than I’d ever heard him before; it sounded almost like a panic attack -- so I brought my eyes to meet his, fully knowing that the last time I’d conceded to my concern for him, I 100% fagged out. I noticed he was still perched on the mattress, his hands buried in his hair and his face twisted in confusion.

Well, at the very least, I wasn’t alone in _that_.

I cleared my throat purposefully, simply to get his attention, and said slowly, “I think that for the sake of my sanity we should pretend that whatever just happened . . . uh, _didn’t._ ”

Tweek nodded emphatically, but he didn’t say anything to confirm or reject my proposition. He was just making his “GAH!” noises, (so loudly that it almost sounded like he was dying), and staring at the dark TV screen. His fingers were still twisted in his hair, and his knuckles were white from how hard he was pulling, but I couldn’t bring myself to draw attention to it. Because anything I could’ve possibly said about how hard he was yanking on his hair would only translate into concern, and the totally gay moment him and I had just participated in made any thought of showing any care for him at all completely out of the question.

I cleared my throat again, this time to actually clear it instead of just getting his attention. “So, uh . . . on that note, I guess I’m going to sleep now.”

“GAH! NGH! Okay!”

There was a long stretch of really, super uncomfortably awkward silence in which I gathered up my mattress and my blanket and put it back on my bed where it belonged. I shot him one last glance, and saw that he had not changed position, before I turned away to climb into my bed, saying vaguely over my shoulder, “Okay, so . . . goodnight.”

“EHH! Oh, Jesus! ‘Night!” was Tweek’s answer.

I pulled the blanket over my still-clothed body, trying to ignore how strange it was to attempt actual sleep wearing jeans, and turned to face the wall. I couldn’t stand to look at Tweek anymore; there was a very large possibility of me completely losing all of my . . . _sanity_ , like I told Tweek.

He was draining me. That fucking asshole was _draining_ me, and I couldn’t fucking stop it. My entire life had shifted entirely the second I met Tweek. He started off as my twitchy roommate that I refused to recognize as anyone other than my twitchy roommate. And then he was my friend, and then he was my best friend, and then . . .

Hmm.

Moments like _that_ started popping up ever since the party Tweek and I were tricked into going to. I was pretty good at pretending like they didn’t happen at all, but hugging it out and letting myself get lost in some asshole’s fucking _eyes_ changed the game entirely. I just didn’t know what exactly it had turned _into_ , and I was uncertain of my standing in my mortal existence to question it.

At some point, there was some shifting of a mattress and some blankets, and then a light turned off, and I assumed that Tweek was going to go to sleep, too. Or he was just going to face the wall and pretend to be sleeping, like I was. But I _needed_ to know what he was doing, as fucking stupid as that sounds. I needed to know if I was the only one freaking out, because I never freaked out, and the fact that I _was_ freaking out was disturbing me in ways that I didn’t want to think about.

Ways that made me think that maybe Kenny and Butters and all the guys from South Park might _possibly_ have been somewhat _right_ about my friendship with Tweek, and how close we really were.

But as soon as the thought entered my brain, I shook my head, squeezed my eyes shut, and groaned quietly. Because fuck it, no, because he was just my best friend, and it wasn’t anything more, and I _wasn’t_ going to think about it.

After about ten minutes -- though it could’ve been more or less, I was still reeling -- of restlessly facing the wall, I turned on my side to look at Tweek, but kept my eyes closed so that he’d think I was still sleeping. I waited until my mattress settled before risking opening my eyes. Tweek was sitting up, but huddled over, and he was typing furiously at his phone, which was clutched in his shaking hands. Who the fuck he was texting at that time of fucking morning, I had no fucking clue. Tweek never really elaborated on who his friends were in Denver, and Kenny was the only other person our age that I was sure had Tweek’s number. And, even though Kenny was still awake, clearly, I couldn’t picture Tweek texting fucking _Kenny_. The image in my head of the two of them being friends didn’t match up correctly, so I figured it was just one of Tweek’s old classmates.

But fuck who he was talking to, I was mostly curious in what he was talking _about_.

I squinted my eyes to see if I could read his lips from all the way across the room and with the dim bluish light from the screen of Tweek’s phone. Tweek’s texting habits reflected everything else about Tweek’s personality in that he was a really fucking weird texter, too. I had never really seen him do it -- he wasn’t very attached to his cell phone, and very rarely used it to actually communicate with anyone -- but he was mouthing the words furiously as his fingers shot across the touch screen of his phone.

All I could make out, though, were the broken words, “Sorry,” “I,” and “tomorrow.”

* * *

It was hard to function the next morning after the weird night I had had with Tweek. In theory, I was content ignoring it had happened, even if my brain hadn’t exactly caught up with that particular decision, and, when I shook Tweek awake groggily, (after getting very little sleep), it took the spaz a bit longer than normal to wake up. And when he did, his entire face looked like he’d been hit by a truck.

“Jesus, Tweek, what time did you fall asleep?” I asked, turning away to make my bed.

Tweek groaned, and there was some shifting of his bed sheets as he slowly rose to his feet. “Mmmm. I don’t know. Late.”

I hummed softly, but didn’t answer. It seemed like he was just about as disturbed as I was about the whole thing, and I wasn’t sure if I was happy with that fact or not. “Well . . . get going. You have VisCom today.”

He just groaned again, sluggishly beginning his morning routine.

It took about ten minutes longer than normal for us to leave our dorm room, because him and I were so tired that just moving felt like there were weights tied to our shoulders. By the time we did leave, the stairs woke us up a little bit more, (because we were on the fucking _third_ floor), and the icy blast of outside just finished the job.

Tweek wrapped his arms around himself, clearly trying to retain as much body heat as possible, and, in that moment, I realized that I made the right decision in getting him that coat.

My mind was ringing with the events of the day before, but I pushed all of those fucked up thoughts down like I would the contents of an overflowing trash can, and instead focused on something else. Like trying to figure out a way to give Tweek his new coat. There really wasn’t all that great of a place to bring it up, because I was going to be awkward about it no matter where or when I said it. While maybe using more flowery words might seem appropriate for the situation, I knew Tweek probably wouldn't appreciate it, because flowery was the exact opposite of my personality. The best, most Craig way to do it would be to just say it without holding back. Unapologetic. The Tucker way.

So, most of our walk was silent, but about halfway there, I blurted out, “I got you something,” which was a statement that caused me to cringe, as I really hadn’t planned on saying it. It came out like word vomit, and probably the only reason I had said it at all was because I was still trying to figure out a way to give him the contents of the massive plastic bag still sitting, all lonely, at the back of our closet.

Tweek looked over at me with a raised eyebrow. “Like a present?”

I shrugged, uncomfortable by his question, and the situation in general. “I guess. It’s not wrapped or anything.”

The expression on Tweek’s face slipped into one of curiosity, and he -- probably unconsciously -- leaned towards me, knocking our shoulders together. “What is it?”

“A coat.”

“Like a jacket coat? That you wear outside?”

I snorted, pinching the bridge of my nose. “Sure, I guess. That’s a weird way to put it.”

Tweek rolled his eyes, righting himself and walking normally. “Where is it?”

“Back in our dorm room. In our closet.”

“Dude, how long’s it been there? I was just in the closet yesterday morning!”

“You’ve been out of the closet for longer than a day, Tweek,” I said, chuckling a little bit at my own joke.

He rolled his eyes again, punching me lightly on the shoulder. “Shut up, Craig. Can I see it today?”

“See what today?” Kenny interrupted, coming out of fucking nowhere from my right. I glanced at him, nodding at Butters, who waved at Tweek and I from his place beside Kenny, their hands clasped and swinging childishly. Before I could say anything, Kenny added, “Oh, are you talking about the coat I picked out for Tweek?”

I cleared my throat, trying to qualm my irrational irritation. “You mean the coat _I_ picked out?”

Kenny smirked, turning his eyes to a still-curious Tweek. “Ignore him, he’s just trying to take credit for someone else’s idea.”

Tweek raised an eyebrow at me, and I frowned. “Tweek, he wanted to get you a black coat with fur.”

Tweek’s eyes widened, and he reached his hands up to grip his hair. “GAH! Fur?! No way, man, what if it wasn’t cleaned right, and I got some deadly disease from some trans species contagious bacteria?! GAH! I could _die_ \--”

I gave Kenny a pointed look, hoping I got across a very smug message of ‘I told you so,’ before turning back to Tweek. “But what if it’s fake fur?” I asked, my eyes flicking again to Kenny, who was watching Tweek and I with an amused expression on his face.

“GAH! _You_ don’t know that!” he exclaimed loudly, and I felt part of me swell at the fact that I had accurately predicted his response.

Tweek’s hands were still buried in his hair, tugging so hard his knuckles were white. It was a weird thing to get so worked up over, but Tweek tended to get worked up over . . . um, how do you say, _everything_ , so I should’ve been prepared for him to freak the fuck out. And I hated when Tweek pulled on his hair; I’d even seen him yank out whole clumps when he was really freaked. So, I shifted my book bag to the side, and carefully put my hands around Tweek’s knuckles, easing them away from his hair. His head whipped around to look at me, clearly surprised by the sudden contact, but I just gave him a shaky, hopefully reassuring smile and said, “No fur. Big hood. Dark blue. They were out of green.”

A wave of gratitude, but still that ever-present surprise that his best friend was _nice_ to him, swept across Tweek’s face. He wrenched his hands out of mine, and, before I had the chance to be embarrassed by my own falter, he wrapped his arms around my waist.

I was starting to lose count of how many times Tweek had just randomly hugged me, and I was both disturbed and flattered equally. It was, however, the first time he had ever hugged me in front of someone else, so I held back a little more than I normally would have. For a fraction of a second, I thought about unwrapping his arms and pushing him away, but I had found that I didn’t mind his sudden hugs, and if I did turn him away, he might never have hugged me again, and that wasn’t something I was willing to risk. So I put my arms loosely around his body, patting him awkwardly on the back and shot Kenny’s dumb fucking smirking face a death glare.

“Not a word,” I mouthed to him as menacing as anyone could mouth anything, but my heated face, paired with the fact that I had 118 pounds of Tweek in my arms, probably didn’t help me at all. I heard a muffled squeaking noise coming from Butters, who had jumped onto Kenny’s arm was was clinging to him, an excited expression on his face. I fucking prayed with everything inside of me that the only people I knew watching Tweek and I were Kenny and Butters, even if Kenny was going to be his normal asshole self, and Butters was cooing like we were some sort of display in a museum.

I was so preoccupied by trying to seem calm and collected that I jumped slightly when Tweek mumbled against my chest, “Thank you, Craig.”

My insides melted at the soft, sheepish sound of his voice, and, no matter how hard I tried, I wouldn’t have been able to stop the smile that came to my face. I looked down at the mess of blonde hair and sighed softly. “Just don’t mention it again, and I’ll say your welcome.”

Tweek lifted his head, keeping his arms around me, and said with a wide, beaming smile, “Can I still keep your sweatshirt?”

I rolled my eyes, smirking. “Knock yourself out. Green’s not my color, anyway.”

He did his little giggle-laugh, and put his head on my chest again. The whole interaction had me actually forget that Kenny and Butters were still standing next to us. It made me forget that we were on a sidewalk, outside in public altogether, and I only realized this when I heard Cartman’s obnoxious laughter.

“ _Ah-hahahaha!_ Get a load of the _fags_!” he exclaimed loudly, and the second his words resonated in my mind, I pushed Tweek away from me, as a reflex to the taunting. He stumbled slightly, but I caught his elbow before he could fall over, which I released immediately when he could stand on his own. He didn’t seem all that fazed by me pushing him; his entire face was bright red due to Cartman’s jeering, and he wrapped his arms around his body protectively, fixing his jittering eyes to his feet. I similarly avoided everybody’s eyes as Cartman continued, “They’re so cute, Kahl, it’s like if a giant and a midget started fucking each other.”

I groaned, running a hand down my face. I let the embarrassment hit me fullforce; I deserved it for fagging it out in _public_ , where assholes like Cartman could’ve seen us.

“I think the correct term is ‘little people,’ fatass,” Kyle said, and, although I was purposefully ignoring all of my surroundings, I could hear the laughter in his voice.

“Who fucking cares, that was the funniest fucking thing I’ve ever seen!”

I narrowed my eyebrows, my eyes still glued to the sidewalk. “It’s not that funny,” I grumbled, but that just made Cartman laugh louder.

I didn’t know how to defend myself in that situation, and I didn’t expect Tweek to say anything. If he even tried, he would stutter and make it sound like our hug . . . _meant_ something, and that would just make things worse. Our savior came in the form of Kenny, of all people, who said, “You guys, maybe now’s not the time to make fun of Craig and Tweek.”

“Y-yeah,” Butters agreed.

“Why, did someone die?” Marsh asked, and the fact that it seemed like everyone from South Park was there for my humiliation made me feel worse.

“No,” Kenny said. “Craig just did something nice for once, and it probably won’t happen again for another eighteen years, so maybe lay off.”

Tweek’s confused voice made me look up. “What are you talking about? Craig’s really nice.”

I was somewhat surprised that he so willingly spoke in front of the other guys, but I pushed that surprise down and frowned at him. “No, Tweek, I’m really not.”

“Yeah, he’s not,” Clyde interjected, wrapping an arm around my shoulders. Or trying to, at least, considering I was a good four inches taller than him. “I don't think he’s done a single nice thing the entire time I’ve known him. He’s a Grade A asshole.”

I shrugged Clyde off of me. “Yeah, what he said.”

“I don’t know, Craig _has_ to have a nice side,” Kyle said offhandedly. “Everybody does.”

I guess I spoke too soon about Kenny’s redeeming qualities, because he snorted, and said, “And I guess the key to Craig’s nice side is Tweek. Jesus, you were short of Satan back in South Park.”

My frown deepened. “Okay, I was bad, but I wasn’t _Satan_ bad. Fuck, even _Satan_ wasn’t all that bad. There just wasn’t a whole lot that I gave a fuck about.”

Clyde tried to wrap an arm around me again, but I foresaw this and shoved him away from me. He rolled his eyes. “Well, you clearly give a fuck about Tweek, as hilarious as I’ll always find that.”

“Yeah, you and the spaz are, like, living a bullshit, unfunny rom com,” Cartman added. “One where there’s all this horsecrap build up to something everyone knew was gonna happen. Just fucking screw each other already, get it over with.”

“It only stings for a few seconds, but it gets better,” Kyle agreed.

Before Tweek and I had the chance to defend ourselves further, Kenny sucked in an excited breath and exclaimed, “So you _are_ a bottom! Fuck, dude, I’ve been trying to figure out who topped for the past four years!”

“Yep, Kahl’s my little cum dump,” Cartman said, snaking an arm around Kyle’s waist. “My sweet little Jewish cum dump --”

Kyle shoved Cartman away from him, his eyebrows narrowed and his face contorted into an ugly scowl. “Eric Cartman, I told you to _never_ call me that again!”

Cartman rolled his eyes. “Like I’d ever listen to anything you tell me, Jewrat.”

I exchanged a look with Tweek, and I could tell we were both thinking the same thing:

 _These guys are so fucking stupid, it’s un-fucking-believable_.

“If you still want me to tolerate your existence, you’ll start,” Kyle spat back, folding his arms over his chest.

Cartman scoffed, folding his arms over his chest. “Oh, fuck my ass and call me a whore, Kahl’s throwing a bitch fit, what a surprise --”

“If you’d stop being such an asshole every fucking _second_ of your life, then I wouldn’t get so pissed off all the time --”

Cartman didn’t seem to have taken a liking to Kyle’s response, and he shouted back, “What the fuck did you think you signed up for when _you_ started this?” He slammed his fists into Kyle’s chest, causing Kyle to almost fall over, but he righted himself before he did. His eyes narrowed dangerously, and he pushed Cartman back violently in retaliation. Stan and Clyde -- who had been standing on either side of the two -- backed away out of the warzone and watched with amused smirks at the fight.

“I love it when they fight like this,” Clyde muttered to me giddily. “It’s so fucking hilarious --”

“I _thought_ maybe you’d fucking change --” Kyle continued angrily.

“I _have_ fucking changed, you’ve just been spending half your time being a fucking bitch about everything --” Cartman pushed him back, but Kyle gripped Cartman’s upper arms, holding him in place.

“Fuck you so _fucking_ hard, Cartman --”

Cartman grabbed onto Kyle’s arms, too, yanking Kyle’s thin body towards him violently. “Fuck _you_ so fucking hard, you cocksucking, toadlicking, assface!”

Kyle growled, pulling himself so close to Cartman that their noses touched. Their eyes were narrowed angrily, teeth barred, their faces red, and their eye contact was burning. “I hate you so fucking much, Cartman,” Kyle hissed.

“Good, ‘cause I hate you too, you sneaky little Jewrat,” Cartman snapped back quietly.

They both fell silent after that, although the rage on their faces didn’t lessen at all. Their fight had been so loud that the entire lobby area was completely silent, and stray bystanders rubbernecked the scene as they passed.

I watched them carefully, because their position was strikingly familiar, considering Tweek and I had been there the night before. Their locked eyes, the closeness, it was all too much, too fast, and it got even worse when Cartman growled, “Your ass is mine, get it back to our dorm room before I kick it there.”

Kyle pulled away, grumbling back, “Don’t tell me what to do, fatass.”

Cartman dragged a willing-enough-looking Kyle down the sidewalk, and the last thing we heard from either one of them was, “One more word out of you and I’ll have you on your knees so fast, your ass won’t even know what happened.”

Their departure left an awkward feeling for everyone they left behind, but the brief lull in conversation was broken by Kenny, who’s too-casual voice said, “Hmm. Usually they beat the shit out of each other and _then_ fuck.”

“Guess they got too worked up too fast,” Clyde said, nodding.

Stan held his stomach, his face green, so I didn’t expect him to answer, and I didn’t expect Tweek to say anything, and I’m pretty sure nobody expected me to say anything, either.  

But, see, the thing is: the main reason I didn’t say anything wasn’t because I didn’t care. It was because I cared too much.

I was oddly affected by Cartman and Kyle’s fight. I didn’t feel _bad_ or anything, but I just felt . . . weird watching it. I could never picture myself in the sort of the relationship they somehow found themselves in, but that’s only because I didn’t really have the passion for that sort of shit. Whenever I found the one person that I was willing to spend the rest of my life with, our relationship would be so boring, mundane, and domestic that it would make most people fall asleep just thinking about it. Fighting in the middle of an outside lobby, by a fountain with fuck-knows how many witnesses didn’t sound appealing at all. I wasn’t used to screaming matches; I couldn’t even remember the last time I had screamed at someone. Years, not since South Park, probably. Whenever I fought, the only sounds you could hear from me were either grunts, or the occasional jeer. Nothing about Kyle and Cartman’s relationship sounded even remotely attractive at all.

I mean, so first of all, they were both _guys_.

I distinctly remember mentioning -- several times -- that dick wasn’t my cup of tea.

But what shook me the most about the entire situation was that right before they basically announced that they were going to fuck like rabbits, they both had this . . . _moment_ , where they just _looked_ at each other. And it was a familiar look; a look that I actually remembered giving to a specific blonde spaz, who was vibrating away next to me. I had no idea if he was thinking about the same thing I was, and I didn’t know if I wanted him to be thinking about it or not. I didn’t know if I was over-complicating everything, or if I had grown too comfortable in my friendship with Tweek. I didn’t know anything, I had been completely drained of confidence in my own actions, and I couldn’t fucking stand it. I was always so in control, but I was all torn up inside, and the worst part about _that_ was the fact that I was around other people, instead of underneath my blankets, alone, in the middle of the night.

The one place where being sad is tolerable at best.

Just thinking about fucking everything made my insides tremble, so I elected to stop thinking about it, and announced abruptly, my voice slightly shaky,

“I’m going back to my dorm room.”

There was a beat of awkward silence, before Stan shared a confused look with Clyde and said, “Uh . . . okay.”

“But class hasn’t even started yet?” Kenny asked. I couldn’t detect one singular emotion in his voice, and there was no fucking way I was looking up from my feet just to see the expression on his face, so I shrugged, and said simply,

“I’ll skip.”

There was another beat of silence.

“Gee, Craig, you don’t look so good --” Butters began, his motherly voice dripping with concern.

I cleared my throat exaggeratedly. “Tweek, I’ll pick you up later?” I asked, hoping against hope that everybody would be able to tell that I wasn’t in the mood to be made fun of, while also not finding it important enough to worry about me.

“GAH! Well, actually, I was going to hang out with Kenny and Butters after class today,” Tweek’s hesitant voice answered. I could hear the worry in his voice, but I didn’t want to deal with that, so, when I heard him say, “Are you --”

I cleared my throat to interrupt him, and took a few backwards steps in the attempt to escape faster. “Okay, great. Sounds good. Then I’ll see you . . . whenever.”

Nobody had an answer to that, so I adjusted my book bag nervously, muttering out a weak, “‘Kay, ‘bye,” before turning away and hurrying down the sidewalk. Part of me expected Tweek to follow me, and quite a lot of me hoped he would, but I didn’t hear any footsteps coming after me, and as I made my way down the somewhat full but simultaneously lonely sidewalk, I wasn’t sure if I was happy about that or not.

It was probably for the best, anyway.

* * *

Maybe I was over _simplifying_ the fight with Cartman and Kyle.

Because, I mean, Tweek was really observant when he wanted to be, and he was clearly paying attention to the fight. We gave each other that look that we always give each other when somebody does something stupid.

And Tweek was anxious about everything, and something _happened_. I wasn’t crazy; when Tweek and I were just staring at each other, it was _not_ normal friend staring. It wasn’t . . . _more than friend_ staring, but it was more than _just_ friend staring. If that made any fucking sense at all.

I groaned, letting my head fall back onto the pillow, and I stared at the ceiling. It was hard to put things into perspective when my life had ever been as complicated as it was in that moment. I had nothing to compare it to. And it was all _Tweek’s_ fault.

But, as hard as I tried, I couldn’t really bring myself to be mad at him, even if he fucking deserved it. Because he was my Tweek, and he was one of the nicest people I’d ever met, and he didn’t _actually_ deserve it.

“Fuck,” I mumbled, resting my forearm over my eyes and gripping my bed sheets tightly in my other fist. “ _Fuck_.”

That pretty much summed up my feelings about the situation.

When Tweek came home from hanging out with Kenny and Butters, he was pretty happy. He went on this long-winded rant about how neat Kenny’s apartment was, and how Kenny and Butters were so nice to him, and it was really, really fun. I listened and everything, but my mind was somewhere else.

After he had told me every little detail, (down to what Kenny had made for lunch), he stopped suddenly and said, “GAH! Jesus, I almost forgot!”

I raised an eyebrow. “Forgot what?”

“The coat!” he exclaimed, gripping the front of his green button-up tightly. “Can I see it?”

I had completely forgotten about it, too, given the events of the afternoon. “Oh. Yeah, sure. It’s in the plastic bag in the closet.”

As Tweek ventured into our closet to retrieve his coat, I rested my hands on my bed behind me and looked up at the ceiling. I knew in my gut that Tweek was going to like his coat -- fuck, he had told me earlier that day that he was going to like it, because I knew that guy’s tastes like I knew my own.

And I was right, because he immediately put it on -- despite the fact that we were inside -- and sat on his bed, pulling out his notebook, and saying “Thank you,” every thirty seconds.

He only stopped saying it when I told him to shut up.

* * *

Even though Tweek was in a good mood Thursday afternoon, he was acting really fucking weird the next day. I asked him on Friday night, too, if he wanted to hang out, maybe play a hand of cards or something, but, after we had finished studying, he was pretty much out the door to hang out with Kenny and Butters instead. He looked really awkward and guilty about it, too, fiddling with his shirt front and mumbling rapid apologies like he thought I was going to be mad that he already made plans. I didn’t understand why he was so upset about it. Because, yeah, it was a little disappointing that Tweek had plans without me, especially because I’d gotten so used to being able to just spend time with him without having to share him with anybody else, but it was good for him. As much as I wanted to just tuck him in my pocket, like I’d told him I would do after the party the weekend before, I knew that a healthy social life would work wonders for his anxiety. Besides, he could’ve picked worse friends than Kenny and Butters.

Saturday took fucking forever to come, but _finally_ it did. I fell asleep Friday night fucking jazzed out of my mind, and I woke up at nine o’clock with a smile on my face. I sat up, and stretched briefly, but I was so awake and excited that I didn’t really need to do much waking up to be in a good mood. Usually it took a solid half hour, and maybe a little banter with Tweek in order to put myself in a place where I could function with a somewhat positive attitude, but the events of the day were so fucking exciting that I wasn’t capable of being in a bad mood.

I looked over at Tweek, and smiled when I saw him sleeping peacefully, partially on his back with his limbs sprawled all over the place. I watched him for a few seconds, before deciding that sleep was no longer a good thing for him.

Binging Red Racer with me, however, _was_.

I threw my blanket off of my body and hopped lightly to my feet. I made my way over to Tweek’s side of the room, and leaned over him. “Tweek . . .” I whispered, tapping lightly at his cheek. “Tweek, wake up . . .”

“Mmm . . . go away, Craig . . .” Tweek mumbled, turning away from me.

I rolled my eyes, and leaned closer to him, tugging gently on his hair. “Tweek,” I said in a louder voice. “Tweek, seriously, get up . . .”

Tweek growled, slapping at my hand. “‘Mm tired, leave me alone . . .”

“I hoped it wouldn’t come to this,” I muttered, straightening up, and staring down at him. He had already fallen back asleep, and therefore didn’t answer me, so, in order to, shall we say, _get his attention_ , I yanked the pillow out from under his head, and smacked him on the face with it.

Tweek bolted upright, “GAH!”ing all the way, his eyes wide and his body trembling from the sudden wake-up call. He took a few deep breaths before glaring at me, and said, “Craig, what the _fuck_?!”

“Oh, good, you’re awake,” I said, turning away towards my side of the room. “It’s Saturday, get your lazy ass up.”

Tweek growled under his breath, and I heard a soft “fwoomp,” noise as he fell back onto his mattress. “GAH! Sometimes I really hate you, Craig.”

I smirked, lifting my pillow so I could make my bed. “And sometimes I really hate you, too, Tweek. Now, hurry up and make the fort, I can’t _wait_ for Red Racer to wipe the floor with Black Racer’s evil father.”

“Uh . . . actually, Craig, um . . .” Tweek’s voice trailed off, and I looked at him over my shoulder. He was sitting up in bed, his hands clinging fast to the front of his shirt, and he was biting his lip as he stared at his legs.

“What is it, Tweek?” I asked, trying to make my voice as soothing as possible.

Tweek sighed deeply, glancing up at me with reluctant eyes. “I was -- NGH! AHH -- going to hang out with Kenny today . . .”

That took me by complete surprise. Him and I were just talking about it the night before, how excited we were for the show’s big finale, but he was suddenly skipping out on me? I was partially shocked, partially irritated, but a whole lot of curious to hear his thought process. “But we were gonna finish Red Racer today.”

“I know, but . . . some things came up, and I just . . .” Tweek sighed, his eyes squeezing shut and his face marred with worry and guilt. “I’m sorry, Craig . . .”

I rolled my eyes. I wasn’t really in the mood for apologies. That burning in my chest was fresh and painful, and him saying _sorry_ wasn’t exactly going to make it go away. “When exactly were you planning on telling me that? Before or after we made plans?”

Tweek scowled at me, although I had no fucking idea why he had the right to be angry. He was the one skipping off into the sunset with fucking _McCormick_. “I was scared you were going to be mad at me!”

I shook my head, and turned around to fiddling with the blanket on my bed, like I was getting ready to make it. “Yeah, well. Whatever. I hope you have fun. I’ll just finish the show by myself.”

I couldn’t see Tweek’s face, but his voice sounded irritated and pissy. “GAH! You can’t watch it without me!”

I raised an eyebrow, even though I knew he couldn’t see me, and my hand stilled. “Why not?”

“Because we watch it _together_!”

“You’re right. We do. Today was the appointed day for finishing Red Racer, and you’re ditching me for Kenny --”

“GAH! _I’m not ditching you!_ ”

I turned around to face him, and folded my arms over my chest. “Okay, then what _are_ you doing?”

Because he clearly didn’t have an answer to that question, Tweek’s anger slipped away, and he averted his eyes. “Uh . . . I . . . well I’m not _ditching_ you --”

I huffed, and turned away again. I was finished with the conversation. “Whatever. Don’t worry about it.”

“GAH! Well, it’s too late for that _now_!”

I shrugged again, but didn’t answer. As far as I was concerned, his anxiety wasn't my problem anymore. He clearly didn’t really take my feelings into consideration before abandoning our plans for someone else, so I didn’t really see why I had to take his feelings into account, especially when I was pissed beyond belief.

Tweek dressed quickly, and didn’t even bother to make his coffee, before slipping his coat on over his misbuttoned shirt. He grabbed his phone and his wallet, shoving them in his pocket, and hurried to the door, obviously desperate to escape the tense, rage-filled air. He put a hand to the doorknob, and I, having been watching the entire process out of the corner of my eye while also pretending like I wasn’t watching the entire process out of the corner of my eye, tried to act like I wasn’t bothered beyond belief that he was actually leaving. He hesitated, and, for a second, I thought he was going to change his mind, and decide that, “Fuck Kenny, Craig’s my best friend, what the fuck was I thinking?” but all he did was look over his shoulder at me and say, “I won’t be _long_. . .”

I rolled my eyes, turning my attention to my phone and typing random numbers into my calculator to make it look like I was doing something important. “Take your time.”

He sighed slowly, before twisting the doorknob and taking a step outside. He hesitated again, although this time I didn’t allow my hopes to rise at all, and he said softly, “I’ll see you later, Craig.”

I shrugged, but didn’t answer him.

I mean, in retrospect, I was acting like a little bitch, but it actually kind of . . . hurt to see him leave. I didn’t care that he was making new friends; fuck, I was _happy_ for him. It meant he wasn’t tied down to just me. It meant he was evolving from the twitchy little spaz that was hiding under his bed from his roommate the first time we had ever met. He was slowly getting better at enjoying himself in a social setting, I was so fucking proud of him.

But he ditched me. We had plans, and he fucking ditched me. I wouldn’t have _cared_ if he just told me he wanted to hang out with Kenny, before he agreed to watching the rest of Red Racer with me.

But he _agreed_.

And then he left. Guilty or not, he fucking _left_.

And after he was gone, I seriously was just going to watch the _fuck_ out of the last episodes of Red Racer. I wanted to watch them in slow motion, in fast forward, in normal speed, muted, with the volume blasted; I wanted to memorize every bit of dialogue, so that when Tweek came back from wherever the fuck he was, I could just recite the episodes to him, and he wouldn’t have to worry about watching them, because I would’ve already watched them _for_ him, and he would just get to hear about it, and not get to see it, because he skipped out on me, that two-timing son of a bitch.

But, even though I wanted to spite Tweek so fucking much, I couldn’t bring myself to do it. He was right. We watched it together, even if he suddenly decided that hanging out with -- ugh -- _McCormick_ was better than finishing the greatest television show to ever air.

So, I decided to just study my biology notes until Tweek came back.

Yep. Studying fucking _biology_ was how I spent my Saturday morning, and early afternoon. I had a test later on that week, but it was far enough away that I didn’t technically need to worry about it yet, but I literally couldn’t think of anything else to do.

I really wished Tweek hadn’t left.

* * *

Maybe an hour later, after my eyes had grown extremely heavy from staring at cell diagrams in the structure of human skin, I heard the key in the lock, and I straightened up, looking away from my biology notes. I was partially prepared to give Tweek the cold shoulder, just to be petty, but I was also just kinda glad he was back. The dorm room was surprisingly lonely without him.

Tweek slipped inside, and closed the door behind him, keeping his back to me for a few long, confusing seconds, before turning around and giving me a sheepish look. “Hey, Craig . . .”

I frowned at him, even though I wasn’t really all that mad anymore. Just mildly upset, and maybe slightly irritated that he was _pretending_ he hadn’t ditched me. “Tweek. How was hanging out with _McCormick_?”

He started fiddling with the zipper of his coat. “GAH! Not that great . . . Kenny’s kind of a jerk . . . I was hanging out at his apartment, and he tried to -- NGH! EHH!” Tweek shivered, his eyes squeezing shut. “He tried to _kiss_ me.”

My heart dropped to my stomach. “He _what_?!”

“Y-yeah,” Tweek said shakily. “I just barely made it out of there before he could.”

I huffed, shaking my head. “What a whore. That asshole tried to _cheat_? On _Butters_?”

Tweek nodded. “I didn’t see that coming --”

“Jesus, nobody even saw them being a couple to begin with coming, but Kenny’s always been a manwhore, I’m not exactly surprised.”

Tweek just let out a few anxious noises, before unzipping his coat, tossing it on his bed. Instead of going to his bed, he crossed the room, taking my notes from my hand, and plopped them on my bedside table. He took a seat next to me, and observed me for a few seconds, before saying, quietly, “I’m sorry . . .”

I raised an eyebrow at him, both at his actions, and his words. I mean, most of me realized that Tweek pulled a total dick move on me earlier that day, and that I totally did deserve an apology for that, but I was never really _expecting_ one. I figured, if he really felt bad, he’d have some way of making up for it. That was the difference between anxious Tweek, and guilty Tweek. Guilty Tweek was quieter, more thoughtful, and less paranoid, surprisingly enough. “Sorry for what?”

“For ditching you for Kenny . . . you’re my best friend, Craig, and I shouldn’t have done that.”

I observed him for a moment before deciding he really did look guilty, and I smiled at him. “It’s fine, Tweek. I was just super pissed, but I understand. You’re making friends. That’s a good thing. I shouldn’t get mad at you for that.” I put a hand to his shoulder and he smiled at me. “Just don't forget the ones you already have.”

Tweek’s lips quirked thoughtfully. “Are we still even friends, though?”

That confused me. “Of course we’re still friends. What are you talking about?”

Tweek smiled and looked at me from underneath his eyelashes. My stomach jolted at the suggestiveness in his gaze, and I pulled my hand away quickly. “I don’t know . . . it just doesn’t feel like we're _just_ friends anymore. I mean . . . you don’t feel something _more_?”

I leaned away from him, but he just leaned closer to me, still smiling that dumb, stupid smile that was making my insides melt. “Come on, everybody else thinks so. You can’t say you haven’t ever thought of it.”

I gulped, holding an arm up to keep him at bay. “No, I can’t say I ever have,” I stammered, confusion taking over any other emotions that I might’ve felt in that situation. Tweek raised an eyebrow at me, and, with that look, came a realization that made my eyes widen and my jaw fall open. “Wait, are you . . . does that mean _you_ have?”

Tweek chuckled, and the sound shot straight to the bottom of my stomach. “I think about it all the time.”

I was about to answer, but my words evaporated when I felt a heated, trembling hand on my knee. I gaped in complete and utter shock at the alluring expression on his face. I had never seen anything like that from him at all. I always thought he was too pure to be seductive, but he clearly wasn’t, and my heart clanged painfully when he leaned even closer and whispered in my ear,

“I think about _you_ all the time.”

Despite my best efforts, I couldn’t bite back a moan, and caved under the heat in my stomach. I swear, it was almost a gut reaction to Tweek’s . . . advances. I leaned towards him, allowing him to wrap his arms around my neck. My own hands found their way to his waist, and I clung to him, afraid to let go.

“Do you think about me?”

“Mmm . . .” I bit my lip harshly, collecting my breath, before I muttered back, “No . . . but I will now --”

Tweek laughed again, and he rested his forehead against mine. “We don’t have to think anymore _now_ ,” he added in a quiet voice, and my breath hitched again when I felt him slide into my lap, a knee on either side of my hips. “We just have to _feel_. Can you feel with me?”

“Jesus Christ, yes,” I moaned, my thumbs stroking his sides. The feeling of his heated body against mine was making my skin tingle, and my heart race faster than the speed of light, and all conscious thought left me as I reveled in his soft skin and the wide hazel eyes that were staring right back at me like he was studying my soul. “Feel me all the fuck you want, Tweek.”

Tweek rolled his hips, pressing our lower bodies together, and I moaned again, my hands slipping down to his hips and clinging so hard I was sure I’d make bruises in his pale skin, but I was not aware enough of my body to stop, and he didn’t seem to be bothered by the pressure, save for a quick hiss of breath, but it just provoked him to move into me, and we found a careful, gentle, but nonetheless passionate rhythm.

Something hard pressed into my stomach, and I didn’t have to be a rocket science to figure out what it was. But I was unexpectedly _not_ turned off by it, and instead I flicked my hips upwards just slightly, but it was enough to make Tweek cry out, and twist his fingers into my hair under my hat.

“O-oh, God, Craig,” Tweek mumbled, and I shivered at the warm breath against my lips. “ _Jesus_ , you feel better than I ever imagined --”

“You’ve imagined me?” I asked, somewhat deliriously, holding fast to his trembling body.

He let out a breathy laugh, rolling into me particularly desperately. “All the time, man, you have no idea --”

“I think I have an idea,” I muttered back, and I leaned even closer to him, so close that our breath was the same, and we were so close, our lips were brushing against each others, when --

 

“Craig! Craig, man, wake up!”

I felt two hands slapping at my face and I jolted awake, sitting bolt upright and panting. I glanced over at the person who had woken me up, even though I knew there was only one person it could be, and groaned at the sight of the concerned-looking Tweek.

Jesus, you have no idea how real that dream felt and sounded. It was almost like he was _there_ , and I dropped my head into my hands, trying to ignore the stiffness in my pants. I thanked God I somehow twisted into my blankets to hide the -- what I assumed to be -- very obvious bulge.

I had never had a wet dream that powerful before. It’d actually been awhile since I’d had a wet dream to begin with -- not since middle school, and I used to stare at Bebe all the time. And it was about . . .

I groaned again, shaking my head. It was about fucking _Tweek_. Literally.

“Jesus, Craig, are you alright?”

Tweek sounded really panicked, actually. Really, _really_ panicked, and I wiped my hands down my face and tried as hard as I fucking could to look at him. His eyes were wide and his mouth was twisted into a frown, but all I could see was that extremely-fuckable expression from my dream, and I immediately looked away.

“You kept saying my name,” he said as an explanation. “It sounded like a nightmare.”

I nodded at that, feeling grateful that he was too naive to know what a wet dream sounded like. “Yeah . . .” I said, my voice shaky and uneasy. “Yeah, it was a really bad nightmare. That’s what it was.”

“What was it about?” Tweek prodded, leaning closer to me in his interest. I compensated by leaning back. I didn’t want a repeat of that dream. No fucking way. “Was I dying? Did I get eaten?”

Thank fuck he broke out some of his weird-ass theories, because I did _not_ want to have to answer him. “Eaten? What would you be eaten by?”

Tweek’s hands flew to his hair. “I don’t know, man! Cannibals, or wild dogs, or mountain lions, _something_!”

I cleared my throat, and looked away. “Well . . . you didn’t get eaten, I promise.”

“Oh . . . good . . .” His voice was relieved and almost breathless, like his own safety in my subconscious was something that would actually affect him in the real world. He really did have a hard time differentiating between reality and fiction.  

I adjusted my position so that I was sitting upright, with my arms draped over my lap so as to hide my embarrassing boner as much as possible. It was slowly going away the longer I kept my gaze from him, which was probably the best part of that entire situation. But I knew one way to get rid of my sudden tent, and that was to ask,

“How was your time with _McCormick_?”

because there was hardly an answer he could give me that would satisfy me at all.

And it seemed I was right in that assumption, because Tweek brightened slightly, a small smile coming to his face. “It was really fun, actually! Kenny made coffee, and let me drink almost all of it! It wasn’t as good as mine, but it was still pretty good, anyway. He’s a great cook, too! He made spaghetti!”

Yep. Dick officially limp.

I frowned, not having brought my eyes back up to Tweek’s face quite yet. I just hummed in response, fiddling with the handles of my chullo.

“And it’s a good thing I was there, too, ‘cause Butters had to leave unexpectedly really late last night, so Kenny wasn’t in the greatest mood --”

I narrowed my eyes when he said ‘it’s a good thing I was there’, because, as far as I was concerned, it was a pretty _bad_ thing that he was there, and it seemed like he’d forgotten my stance on the whole situation. But I just hummed again, and didn’t say anything.

“He’s teaching me how to play poker!” Tweek said happily, standing up from his place kneeling on the floor, and he started pacing excitedly. “So now I can go to poker nights with the other guys!”

A very heavy feeling suddenly landed onto my shoulders at that. I didn’t even know that there were poker nights with the other guys. I mean, it’s not like I would’ve gone to every single one, but it’d been awhile since I had played poker at all. (It was pretty much a requirement for living in South Park; you just couldn’t get away with not knowing how to play.) I actually liked poker. I was good at it, because my face hardly ever changes expression. I won almost every hand of poker I’d ever played, simply because my poker face was like a concrete wall; nobody could see through it. Clyde always used to tell me that my face was made for competitive gambling. I . . . sort of took that as a compliment.

But, no, I wouldn’t get . . . _bitter_ about being left out while Tweek was included. It was good that Tweek was getting in so good with the other guys, but I suddenly felt extremely . . .

Lonely. Really, really fucking lonely. It was like my first month in Middle Town all over again, and it fucking _sucked_ , only it was worse, because I had gotten closer to Tweek since I’d met him that I ever really got to Clyde, even in all the time I’d known _him_.

Tweek continued on his excited rambling, oblivious to my anger. “Kenny said they hadn’t had one yet, that it was more of an idea in progress, but he said he’d text me when he found out! You should come with us!”

The way he phrased that made it sound like Kenny and him were the best friends, and I was that one friend that never got invited anywhere, but was still technically part of ‘the group’. Out of my gang in South Park, that was always Jason. He was always the spare, and I had to grit my teeth at the thought that _I_ was suddenly the spare. It was a bad feeling, and that bad feeling was 100% the cause of my following statement: “Are you sure you want me there? You seem to being doing just fine without me.”

Tweek’s excited smile melted into one of confusion. “GAH! Why _wouldn’t_ I want you there?”

I shrugged stiffly. “I don’t know. Why _would_ you?”

He frowned, his own confusion clearly starting to irritate him. “Because you’re my best friend.”

I glanced up at him sharply. “Am I?”

Tweek looked me up and down, his eyes narrowed. “Yes, you are. Why are you asking me that?”

“Well, I mean, I don’t know, it just seems like you prefer McCormick, that's all.”

Tweek sighed heavily. “Craig, don’t be like that.”

I shrugged, feigning ignorance. “Don’t be like what? I’m just stating facts here.”

Tweek didn’t look too happy at that response. “First of all, that's not a fact, because it’s not true.” That made part of me feel better, but I was still reeling at being tossed aside so carelessly. “And second of all, you’re being a total asshole about this whole thing!”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “Well, _I’m_ sorry, I’m just not exactly _pleased_ that you'd rather hang out with McCormick than me, your so-called _best friend_.”

“GAH! I _knew_ it! You just don’t want me to have any other friends!” Tweek accused wildly, folding his arms over his chest and glaring daggers at me. It seemed like he really fucking believed that, too, which just pissed me off even more, because I had always made a point to reassure him that I didn't want to be _exclusively_ his friend. I encouraged him to make friends with whoever the fuck he wanted to be friends with, even fucking _Clyde_ , who was basically Cartman, just minus the ignorance and borderline homicidal tendencies.

I scowled at him, and mirrored his body language. “Have I _ever_ told you that? Did I _ever_ tell you that making new friends was a bad thing? I’ve actually been under the impression that I’ve been _supporting_ you having new friends! But just because I want you to make friends, and to live a more normal life, doesn't mean you get to just ditch me when we already had plans! That’s just a-a really _shitty_ thing to do!”

Tweek looked sufficiently subdued, his hands clutching at the front of his shirt as a look of sheepish anxiety crossed his face. His mouth opened and closed as he visibly grappled to find words to respond, and, even though it took a few seconds, he finally managed out, “I --”

I stood up, the blanket splaying all around my feet and hanging half off of my bed. He stared at me, his eyes wide, but even his innocent expression didn’t qualm my white-hot frustration. “I don’t want you to feel tied down to me, I’ve _never_ wanted that!” I continued, narrowing my eyes at him. “You’re my best friend, Tweek, and I thought I was yours, too, but if you think I’m _selfish_ enough to lock you away from the world, just because you think I don’t want to _share_ you, then I’m obviously _not_ \--”

Before I could finish ranting, Tweek crossed the space between us and wrapped his arms around my waist.

I jumped at the sudden physical contact. It wasn’t something I was expecting at all. Tweek and I were in the middle of a fight; I had never been in a fight before that resulted in a random, mid-sentence hug, and there was no hesitation when he buried his face into my sweatshirt and clung to me.

I was still so fucking pissed at him, and him just hugging me out of nowhere wasn’t a one-way ticket out of the doghouse, as far as I was concerned. I kept my arms where they were and stared down at the top of his head. I debated shoving him away from me, but I didn’t always have the greatest control over my strength, and I didn’t want to risk accidentally breaking his arm or something. So I just let him stay there, and refused to touch him back.

“What the fuck are you doing?” I asked, my voice dropping to it’s normal monotone.

“Are you going to forgive me?” Tweek asked, his voice still muffled against my sweatshirt.

I narrowed my eyes, staring down at him listlessly, even though I knew he wasn't looking back. “Depends. Are you going to quit being an asshole?”

Tweek was quiet for a few seconds, before nodding meekly. “Yeah. I -- GAH! -- I really am sorry, Craig. I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings, or anything --”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa,” I interrupted hastily, grabbing hold of his shoulders, prying him off of me, and holding him at arm's length, my fingers tightening on his upper arms. “Don’t make it gay --”

Tweek narrowed his eyes. “AUGH! Is that a _bad_ thing?”

I blushed a light pink at his biting accusation, and slowly shook my head. “No. I didn't mean it like that, I just . . . my feelings weren’t . . . _hurt_ , really . . . I was just super pissed off, that’s all --”

He stared at me for the entire time I spoke, but then just rolled his eyes, a bitter, amused smirk coming to his face. “I hurt you, Craig, you can admit it.”

I looked away uncomfortably. Of all the awkward, brand new, unexpected situations I had found myself in with Tweek, I am confident in saying that that one was the worst. Not only was it the first actual real fight we’d had to have in our friendship, but I was forced to _admit_ to him that, yeah, he actually really fucking hurt my feelings.

That’s just _not_ something I was raised to do. I was raised to flip off whatever thing or person wounded my honor, but I was never supposed to tell anyone that my honor was wounded. It wasn’t the Tucker Way, and, because the personality of every single family member of mine was like someone copy and pasted the same character into different bodies, the need to keep my feelings to myself was actually something I was just born with. Didn’t help that it was enforced by my parents, too.

Which was why the actually comforting look, the understanding expression on Tweek’s face caught me off guard, because I really wasn’t expecting it. Especially not from the person who hurt me to begin with. I let out a long sigh, my fingers tensing on his arms, but not letting him go. “Okay, fine. So, _yeah_ , you . . . hurt my . . .” I grimaced, screwing my face up, “ _feelings_.” I shuddered, my arms relaxing now that the worst had been pushed aside, and that somehow pulled Tweek closer to me again. “Just . . . don’t do it again, okay?”

Tweek smiled at me, forcing himself into another hug, which I reciprocated. He really had been way more hands on than I ever expected the little spaz to be. Fuck, _I_ had been more hands on than I ever expected me to be. “I promise. Is it too late to watch Red Racer?”

I shifted my body in his arms so that I could check my watch. “If we don't sleep tonight, then we should be finished by late tomorrow morning.”

Tweek pulled back again, beaming happily. It was that same smile that he’d only given me a few times, the one that lit up his entire face and gave extra warmth to his already expressive eyes. It was the smile that was impossible to be mad at, so I found myself smiling back.

He did his little giggle laugh, and I rolled my eyes at him. “You’re a fucking asshole, you know that?” I said, ruffling his hair.

Tweek punched me lightly on the shoulder, the smile never leaving his face. “Yeah, I know.”

“Good. I was just making sure you were aware.”

He rolled his eyes, turning away and saying, “Get the show set up, dickhole.”

I shook my head, suppressing the smile that threatened to take over my entire face.

Jesus fuck, Tweek was slowly -- _agonizingly_ slowly -- ruining my life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I realize that some of the characterization is a little... off I guess? in this chapter, so I'm sorry about that. There were some things that needed to happen for the story to work, I guess at the expense of some of the characterization, but it will get better, I promise!
> 
> This chapter dragged on quite a bit, too, but it was a necessary evil. Stay tuned!


	14. You're Worse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is really, really long, and a LOT happens. And be prepared: I know I say it a lot, but this time I am SURE some of it is OOC. 
> 
> Make sure you read the end notes, too!

The thing about not giving a fuck about anything is that, when you eventually (inevitably) start giving a fuck about something, your entire world just flips on it’s side and it’s the worst fucking thing. Because there was nothing I could do about it. It wasn’t like I could _escape_ Tweek, because he was pretty much always around me. Well, when he wasn’t off with Kenny doing . . . whatever the fuck they were always doing. But just spending _some_ time around him made me so fucking happy, and, in the moment, I often found myself not caring about how strange I felt when him and I were together, and how even worse I felt when we weren’t. When we weren’t together, I was able to step away from the situation and look at it the way pre-Tweek Craig would. I could separate my emotions from fact.

Yeah, I couldn’t do that with Tweek around. I felt too good around him to start analyzing the many mannerisms of his that I had started to pick up more and more, and why my analysis was so fucking irrelevant.

And I started noticing more things about him that I hadn’t before. Like how Tweek would yawn with his entire body when he got tired, and he only had about half an hour after his first yawn before he was completely passed out. His yawns almost looked painful; his small mouth gaped open, his nostrils flaring, and his eyes squeezing shut as his body straightened for a few seconds, before collapsing again. He didn’t even try to hide it when he was tired, which was the exact opposite of me. I generally kept that to myself, because I had always thought that being tired was just about the same as being weak. The later you can stay up, the stronger your fortitude is. And, yeah, I was a bit of a pussy as a kid, but I had conditioned myself the older I got, and I had learned tricks along the way to mask even the most advanced exhaustion.

Tweek either hadn’t learned that, or took a page out of my book, and didn’t care.

It was hard not to stare at his mouth when he yawned. His lips were very . . . eye-catching. When he was concentrating, he would either poke his tongue from between his lips, or he would gnaw his bottom lip with his teeth, but both actions catch my attention. And kept hold of my attention long after we had gone in separate directions for class.

And his _nose_. It was small, and it twitched like a rabbit's if he didn’t like something. But if I let myself be drawn to Tweek’s nose, then I probably -- definitely -- would look to his mouth, because, fuck, it was _right there_ , and I fucking knew how dangerous that was.

But, in the moment it didn’t matter. It never mattered. It only mattered when he was gone.

* * *

I was in the hallway of my dorm building, looking straight at the door to Tweek and my room. Room 374. White. Simple. Boring. Just the way I liked my doors.

I put my key into the lock, and the door easily swung open. My eyes swept around the room, and it was in that moment that I realized that I was in a dream, there was absolutely no fucking doubt about that. The room looked different, it fucking _felt_ different. It was warmer than it usually was, our beds were bigger, the floor was clean, and we actually had two desks, instead of one. (Not that either of us ever used it anyway.)

Tweek was sitting on his bed, his legs crossed, and his notebook in his lap. Always him and that fucking notebook; I had no idea what the fuck he was constantly drawing, it was one of the only things left about him that I didn’t know. Unless he lived some sort of secret double life, but I highly doubted that. His tongue was poking out of the corner of his mouth -- a sure sign of concentration -- and his forehead was creased as he stared intently at whatever he was doing. I folded my arms over my chest, letting a small smile cross my lips at the sight of him.

Fuck, he was so fucking adorable.

After a few seconds -- or a few minutes, fuck if I knew -- I decided I had had enough of the silence, so I said, “Hey, Tweek?”

Tweek jumped, his pen flipping out of his hand and onto the floor. “GAH!” he exclaimed, but he relaxed soon enough. He could probably tell it was me by my voice. I had a pretty distinct voice. He let out a breath, before answering, “Yeah, Craig?”

“I’ve got something for you.”

Tweek looked me up and down suspiciously, which I guess was fair. Dream Tweek was different than real Tweek, though I couldn’t really tell you how. Or why. “Like a present?”

I smiled. “Like a present. You wanna see it?”

He nodded, climbing to his feet curiously.

I turned away, digging in the closet for the plastic bag that I had put there days before. The handles were tied kind of tightly, so it took a few seconds of wrestling with the cheap plastic to get the bag open, but when it did, the coat slipped out and onto the floor.

I raised an eyebrow. The coat wasn’t dark blue. It was olive green, the exact color of Tweek’s misbuttoned shirt that he always wore. I frowned thoughtfully, because I could’ve sworn that the coat I got was a dark navy blue, because that second-hand store was out of any green coats his size.

Ultimately, I shrugged, accepting my subconscious’ alteration.

I bent to pick the coat up, and walked over to where Tweek stood, handing him his gift indifferently. Didn’t want to seem like I cared about the fact that I did something nice. It wasn’t my style. Even in a dream, because if I let my dream self slip up, then I risked my real self doing the same thing.

“You got me a coat?” Tweek asked excitedly, taking from my hands immediately and running his chubby fingers along the expensive-looking fabric. Because, along with being a completely different color than my memory served, it also looked . . . nicer. Nicer than a cheap ten dollar coat from a second-hand store.

“Yeah,” I answered, smiling when Tweek immediately shouldered the coat on, zipping it so that the zipper was pretty much pressed against his neck, and wrapping his arms around his waist happily. “Do you like it?” I asked, leaning against the closed door of our dorm room.

He nodded excitedly. “Yeah! It’s so warm!”

I smirked. “You look good.”

Tweek beamed happily at me. “You think so?”

I nodded. “Yeah. Only you’d probably look even better on your knees.”

The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them, but I felt so carefree, and so pleased that Tweek was so happy with me, that I couldn’t bring myself to care. I knew what I insinuated, but, instead of scolding myself for sounding gay, I found myself actually . . . _meaning_ what I insinuated, and I accepted it extremely quickly. Quicker than I normally would have, but my dream self tended to care even less than my waking self did.

Tweek’s face fell, his eyes quirking in confusion. “On my knees?”

“Yeah, you know,” I said, pushing off of the door and taking a few steps forward. “On your knees. Or on your back. Either way, you’d be the sexiest thing alive.”

Tweek’s eyes widened in shock, his jaw falling open, and his hands flew up to his hair, tugging harshly. It was a predictable, endearing reaction, and one that I expected. “GAH! What are you _talking_ about? NGH! EHH! Are you out of your _mind_?!”

“No, I’m pretty in my mind,” I said with a shrug. “And I’d like to be in you, too.”

Tweek looked beside himself with anxiety, (what else was new), but there was a slight hesitancy in his eyes, as well. I clung to that, and took another couple steps toward him, but he looked to be too deep in his thought process to notice. His mouth was closed, his teeth chomping into his bottom lip, and his entire body was shaking. “GAH! I don’t --”

“It’s okay, Tweek,” I said, walking forward with the intention to touch him, but he finally caught onto my plan, and he walked backwards, making the distance between us equal. His eyes were wide, his lips parted slightly, a fact that just added to how terrified he looked. I did feel bad for him, mostly because I was the one that had thrown him into such an advanced state of stress, but he must’ve known that I didn’t mean him any harm. I tried to look as soothing as possible, allowing my lips to relax into an easy smile, my eyes warm and as welcoming as I could make them.

This worked. Marginally, but it worked.

Eventually, Tweek ran out of space, his legs hitting the mattress and he almost stumbled backwards onto his bed. I quickly closed the distance between us, grabbing hold of his elbow to steady his thrown-off balance. Tweek looked down at the point of contact, trembling and shaking, but not pulling away. I clung to that, as well, and released him, instead taking a hold of the zipper of his coat and slowly pulling it down. I gave him all the chance in the world to push me away, but he just stared at my hands, his eyes wide and his teeth gnawing on his bottom lip.

“Would you like me to show you?” I asked lowly, gently ridding his trembling body of the heavy jacket. When it was completely off, and resting haphazardly on his bed, I put a hand to his hip, gripping the jutting bone in my fingers, and tugged him against me. He gasped in surprise, his chest spastically expanding, before he let out a shaky breath. There was that breath again, only that time, I smiled and allowed my body to fully embrace the feelings of pleasure that the warm breath on my chin and neck caused. “It will feel good, I promise.”

Tweek bit his lip again, his eyes narrowing as he sized up my sincerity. I could tell I was swaying his opinion the longer we made eye contact, so I took advantage of my progress, and leaned forward some more so that our faces were only inches away from each other. I took even greater pleasure in the fact that he still hadn't moved away. “Craig, I . . .” Tweek mumbled his eyes shifting from my right eye to my left. “What --”

I put the hand that wasn’t on his hip on the side of his face, cupping his cheek with my palm, and said, “You don’t have to do anything. I’ll take care of you. I always do.”

Tweek let out this deep sound, coming from the back of his throat and sounding like a cross between a moan and a grumble. He leaned into my hand, nuzzling me nervously, and I took that as an open-ended invitation to slide my hand from his hip to his waist, stroking him through his shirt with my thumb. His legs nearly buckled underneath him at that, so I placed my second hand tightly on his waist, braced my knees and lifted him up. He let out a shriek at his sudden change in position, instinctively wrapping his legs around my waist as I shifted my arms so that I was embracing his entire trembling body. He, in return, brought his arms around my neck, and, to make sure I wouldn’t drop him, I turned around and pressed his back up against the wall, careful not to bang his head.

I nuzzled his neck with my nose so that he tilted his head back, and I traced kisses down his jaw to the crook of his neck. When he moaned and shuddered against me, I decided that I liked the little whimpering noises he was making, and I wanted to hear them more, louder, maybe with my name laced in there a few times. I licked and sucked at his heated skin, and smiled when he let out a particularly whiny moan, his hips rolling into me desperately.

“Jesus Christ, Craig,” he panted under his breath. “Oh, God, oh, fuck, please, Craig, please, please --”

“Shh, Tweek, it’s okay,” I mumbled against his neck. I returned the friction gently, but enthusiastically, and smirked when he moaned loudly. “Just relax, everything’s going to be fine. If you get too worked up, just remember, you’re good enough,” I planted a kiss to his jaw, “you’re smart enough,” another kiss to the corner of his mouth, “and doggonit, I love you so fucking much.”

Tweek moaned, his legs tightening as he rolled into me again. “Oh, Jesus, Craig, I . . . fuck, I love you, too --”

I leaned forward all the way, pressing my lips to his harshly, but not so hard that I scared him away, and he immediately started to kiss back. Our lips moved together surprisingly gracefully, considering _I_ had never kissed anyone before and _Tweek_ was the least graceful person on the planet.

Kissing Tweek was fucking awesome. After he was somewhat calmed down, he starting carding his fingers through my hair, and he tilted his head to get a better angle. I moaned, bringing one of my hands to his chest, and dragging it down south, past his stomach, to the forbidden place on everybody’s best friend’s body, but, before I could touch him, a loud beeping noise started coming from all sides of me, so loud that --

 

I gasped, bolting stock straight in my bed. My face was soaked with sweat, my hair sticking to my forehead and feeling like fire under my hat. My body was uncomfortably hot underneath my blanket, and I shifted awkwardly. I was panting, my chest heaving as I tried to gulp as much air into my lungs as I could.

The second the content of my dream caught up with me, I groaned deeply, squeezing my eyes shut, and muttering harshly under my breath, “God fucking _dammit_.”

I had a painfully stiff hard-on, and I wasn’t sure how easy it would be to make it go away. We even had class that day, seeing as it was a Monday, and I still had Tweek to wake up, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t wake Tweek up while sporting a boner that was, essentially, _his_ fault.

I chanced a glance to the asshole himself, despite several warnings in my mind not to. He was sleeping, looking obnoxiously peaceful, blissfully unaware of his central role in my second wet dream in a week and a half.

As if he felt my eyes on him, his lips turned upwards, a deep sound escaping him.

“ _Mmm_. . .”

My eyes snapped wide open. His voice was . . . breathy, and whiny, and strikingly similar to the moan from my dream. Only in my dream, it was fake, but in our dorm room, it was so painfully real, and I knew _exactly_ what the fuck was happening. You would’ve had to be a moron or Tweek not to, and, even though there was a large part of me that was ready to bolt and pretend like it wasn’t happening, something was keeping me in my bed. There was something already so transfixing about a normally-sleeping Tweek, so a sleeping Tweek moaning erotically and beginning to writhe sensually was too much for my still-aching body to handle.

“ _Craig_ . . .” Tweek moaned, his head lolling to the other side so that I could no longer see his face. My heart exploded, my mind racing with the repeating thought,

 _Holy shit, fuck, did he just_ \--

But I was interrupted when he continued, saying  “N-no . . . Not . . . not ‘cause’a Kenny . . .”

My previously wide eyes narrowed. It was an involuntary action; a part of me -- a part that I didn’t realize existed -- had quietly _hoped_ that I was the central focus of Tweek’s dream, in the same way that he was the central focus of mine. (I’m not sure exactly what my reasoning was at the time; maybe I just wanted him to be as confused and twisted as I was so that I wouldn’t be so alone, maybe I was intrigued by the thought of someone being that attracted to me, and it was a nice stroke to my ego, but whatever the reasoning was, the end game was the same.) That hope wasn’t realized until I heard some other guys’ name. And it wasn’t even just some _other_ guy. It was fucking Kenny.

I’d been thinking that a lot. _Fucking Kenny_. Because it seemed like he evaporated out of nowhere constantly, like he was everywhere all at once. Pissed me the fuck off. And I wished it pissed Tweek the fuck off, too, but Tweek didn’t seem to mind. In fact, he was the opposite of minding.

“It’s fine, everything’s okay,” Tweek said, his voice slightly more coherent than it had been before. “I’m not . . . It’s not what you think, I swear . . .”

I stared at him, my gaze unwavering, as I tried to figure out what the fuck he was talking about.   

“Yeah . . . yeah, I promise . . . friends . . . just friends . . .”

I raised an eyebrow. What I gathered from what the conscious Tweek talked about now and again, was that, in his mind, he had three friends: me, Kenny, and Butters. He didn’t really talk about his friends from Denver, so I assumed they had a falling out after high school, like most teenagers do. Butters had already left the week before, so that probably meant Tweek was referring to either me or Kenny, and I found myself hoping for the latter. I couldn’t stand the thought of Kenny and Tweek becoming a . . . _thing_. I was disgruntled enough with them just being friends. The thought of them . . . dating, and fucking each other and shit made a sharp heat pulse in my chest, and I tried to tell myself that it was because I cared about Tweek enough to be worried about him becoming involved with a cheater, but there was a small voice whispering in my ear that that may have been the truth, but it wasn’t the _whole_ truth.

Before I could dwell on it further, a very . . . _very_ pronounced moan -- shaky, but I figured that was a given -- came from Tweek’s side of the room. It shot straight down to my already-stiff cock, and I had to cover my mouth with my hand to stifle any noise that might’ve left me. And, unlike Tweek, I fucking _knew_ what a wet dream sounded like, and the mention of Kenny’s name had brought me to my senses, so I hopped to my feet as quietly as I could, grabbed my shower stuff and my key, and hurried out the door.

A shower sounded good. _Cold_ shower.

I practically ran down the stairs to the bathroom, trying to get there fast enough to avoid any other guys that could’ve been wandering the halls on their way to class. My mind kept replaying that moan -- that delicious moan -- and I was going to just admit defeat and jerk off if I didn’t make the tingling sensation in my body go away.

 

When I put my key in the lock and swung the door to my dorm room open, I was immediately met with the sight of Tweek pacing around the room wildly, both his phone and my phone clutched in either hand. His bed was in disarray, his blanket somehow sideways, and his pillow on the floor, but it was his face that I was most concerned with. One of his eyes was wild with worry, while the other seemed to have just . . . died, and alternated between being squeezed shut and awkwardly half-closed.

I only saw this scene for a few seconds, before Tweek’s attention jerked to me, and, after a beat of staring at each other, he scowled. “ _Fuck_ you, Craig!”

I blinked a few times, trying to figure out what I had done to deserve him snapping at me so abruptly. “Uh . . . what?”

My ignorance apparently made Tweek angrier, because he stomped across the room, an unfamiliar burning in his eyes, and he punched me hard on the shoulder. “Fuck you! You _scared_ me! Where _were_ you?”

Once I understood what he was talking about, I tilted my head. “You’ve woken up when I wasn’t in the dorm room before,” I observed, eyeing him carefully. “And you never really seemed to care before. Everything okay?”

 _Don’t mention your dream, please dear God and anyone else that’s listening, please just make him not mention his dream . ._. As this thought ran through my head, and equally loud thought interrupted, saying, _What the fuck, no_ make _him mention it, I deserve some goddamn answers_.

But Tweek’s flushed face and parted lips suggested I wasn’t going to get anything out of him besides a mumbled, “Just . . . just worried.” He handed me my phone and ran a hand through his hair absentmindedly. “Sorry, just, uh . . . weird night.”

My heart skipped a beat. “Oh, yeah?”

He let out a breath. “Yeah.”

“You wanna talk about it?”

Tweek’s red face paled, and I studied him intently. He was jittery -- like always -- and he wouldn’t return my eye contact. “No . . . that’s okay. I’m fine.” Before I could question him further, he gripped the front of his green pajama shirt anxiously and mumbled, “You took a shower . . .”

I raised an eyebrow at his out-of-the-blue statement. “Yeah.”

“How come? You never take showers in the morning.”

My cheeks heated up at even the prospect of telling what prompted me to take a shower in the morning, and the only thing I could think to do was,

 _Deflect. Deflect. Change the fucking subject,_ now.

I cleared my throat. “Yeah. Another nightmare. I woke up super sweaty and gross and wanted a shower before class.”

“Oh.”

There was a beat of awkward silence.

“Speaking of, get dressed, we’re late already,” I said, turning away and moving to make my disheveled bed.

Tweek didn’t answer, but I heard him ruffling through his clothes, and then the sound of fabric being removed from a body reached my ears. I pretended I didn’t notice.

After a minute, Tweek “GAH!”’d, and said, “Done. Let’s go.”

I grabbed my bookbag and swung it over my shoulder, nodding to Tweek, who was clutching his textbooks and supplies in his arms.

 _Okay, Christmas present idea: a fucking backpack_.

We left the apartment shortly after that, walking faster than normal to avoid being late.

When we arrived at Tweek’s building, I turned to him, adjusting my bookbag on my shoulder, and said, “You want to go out for lunch today?” I wasn’t entirely sure where the question came from, because I hadn’t even been thinking about it before, but I’m pretty sure it had something to do with his dream. It was still floating around my mind, both the sound he made and implications of the two people he mentioned: me, and, what I had recently decided, my rival. I had been feeling a little Tweek-deprived because of how much time he was spending around McCormick, and I figured that that needed to change. If Tweek even wanted me, which seemed less and less to be the case.

Tweek glanced up at me in surprise, which wasn’t exactly out of place, considering him and I never left our dorm room together. “Why?”

I didn’t take too kindly to that response, but shook it off quickly enough, wracking my brain for an equally quick answer. “I don’t know. I just kind of feel like stretching my legs. And I’d rather go out with you than by myself.”

Tweek’s cheeks turned a light pink, but I pretended I didn’t notice for his sake. “Oh . . . well, okay.”

I let out a relieved breath. “Cool. Where do you want to go?”

He shrugged. “I’m fine with anything. As long as --”

“There’s coffee there,” I said with a smile. “You know, most restaurants around here have coffee,” I continued. “And I know you well enough to find them.”

Tweek’s blush deepened, and, again for his sake, I tried as hard as I could to hide my growing smile.

“I have to go,” he mumbled quickly, hiding his face sheepishly. “Class . . .”

I smirked. “Right. Class. Have fun, I guess.”

Tweek muttered under his breath, “Thanks,” before hurrying away from me, a tenseness in his shoulders that made my heart swell.

His likeness to a guinea pig was un-fucking-believable.

* * *

Tweek was leaning against the science building, his books clutched to his chest, and his eyes swept the crowd for me. He didn’t seem nearly as nervous as he did when I first came to pick him up in the middle of September, after he begged me to. He seemed much more at ease, looking somewhat relaxed, even though he still looked a little anxious to be around so many people. But that was a characteristic of his that I didn’t think would change.

I walked up to him, smiling at him when he caught my eye and smiled at me. “How was class?”

He shrugged, pushing off the building and following me as I turned to walk away. “It was good. Boring. I wanted to leave as soon as it started.”

I snorted. “Sounds like me in every class I’ve ever been in.”

Tweek laughed, adjusting his books in his arms. Before he could say anything, I took his books from him and shoved them in my bookbag. Tweek started and said,  “Hey, what --”

“Shut up,” I interrupted as soon as I saw the question coming. “Were you planning on eating lunch with three textbooks just sitting on the table?”

He frowned thoughtfully. “I guess not.”

“Good. Just roll with it. It’ll be better if you do.”

He rolled his eyes. “Fine. So where are we going?”

I shrugged. “It’s up to you, really. There’s Olive Garden, but I’m pretty sure you don’t want to go there.”

He shook his head. “GAH! No _way_ , man, _flashbacks_.”

I smirked. Tweek didn’t exactly have the best time the last time we had gone to Olive Garden, with Kenny and Butters. It was _full_ of people, (every single table was at max capacity), the waitress spilled his coffee all over the table, and he ran right into another customer on his way to the bathroom. It was pretty funny, but I tried not to laugh too hard for his sake. “There’s a diner down the street that’s pretty good. I went there with Clyde and the other assholes after my first class.” I paused, and then shook my head. “Wait, nevermind, the Bitch works there. There’s Applebee's? It’s not too far, I guess, and they have pretty good coffee.”

Tweek looked at me with a raised eyebrow, his lips quirked in a half-smirk. “You don’t drink coffee.”

I glanced at him and smiled. “Yeah, but I just sort of figured.”

He did his little giggle-laugh and rolled his eyes. “Fine. Let’s go there.”

I nodded, and we fell into a comfortable silence. There were quite a few . . . interesting characters out and about that day. A lot of gay people, to put it bluntly. We saw two pairs of lesbians holding hands, and two guys making out in an alleyway that we passed on our way there. I only caught a brief glimpse of it, but I got flustered and looked away.

We were passing a green, where there were even more people kind of loitering about, and I got curious. I stared at the central group, and saw a street performer, juggling four balls impressively. I could only see his top half, but he looked like an asshole, from what I could tell. He was wearing a light pink button-up, long-sleeve shirt, with a lime green vest, (and that’s it, despite the weather), and a hipster-looking beanie-thing on his head. He had curly brown hair, his bangs sticking out of his hat in a very purposeful way. He had a smug expression on his face as he watched the balls pass by each other in the air. I tilted my lips downwards, watching his hands and hoping for him to screw up. But I didn’t have to wait for that to happen, because this other, more heroic, asshole in the audience threw a cheeseburger at him, and it collided with his stomach, leaving a grease stain on his carefully pressed shirt.

I snorted. “Tweek, check out the moron,” I said, turning my head to where Tweek had been standing, only to find the normally Tweek-occupied space on my right to be filled with empty space.

I raised an eyebrow and scanned the area around me. “Tweek?”

When there was no answer, I felt a small, instantaneous, involuntary panic blossom in my chest. “ _Tweek_?”

Again, there was no answer, and, even though Tweek was one of the shortest people I’d met on campus, I was capable of honing in on him if necessary. His loud noises, bright blonde hair, and constantly shaking body made him stand out in a crowd, but I saw none of these characteristics anywhere. I walked quickly forward to see if maybe he had wandered off, (though I found that extremely unlikely), and, after a few moments of surprisingly intense panic, I saw the back of him, standing in front of one of those temporary shed things that had a decoratively written sign that said HARBUCKS.

I ran a hand down my face, irritated with myself for getting worked up so quickly. But, to be fair, he had turned up missing only once before, and we all know how that turned out. I stalked forward in his direction and stopped short behind him, folding my arms over my chest. “ _Tweek_.”

Tweek jumped a solid foot in the air, screeching, “GAH!” and turning around fast to look at me. When he noticed it was just me, he let out a breath, and gave me a small smile. “Oh. Hey, sorry; I smelled coffee,” he said, gesturing to the shed behind him. “Harbucks just opened in town, and they’re giving out free samples. It’s really good!”

I scowled at him. “You ran off! I didn’t know where you went!”

Before Tweek could answer, another voice said, “Oh, there’s the overprotective asshole now. Don’t worry, I took care of him while you were off staring at a street performer.”

I looked over Tweek’s shoulder and saw Kenny, a coffee-stained white apron with the Harbucks logo in the corner tied around his waist. Guess he worked at _Harbucks_ , too. I was surprised he had any free time at all, working three jobs and attending college full-time. I ignored the absurdity of Kenny’s apparent manipulation of time, instead focusing on his words. “Need I remind you that the last time Tweek went missing, he was getting beaten in an alley?”

Kenny rolled his eyes, resting a hand on the stand’s table-clothed surface. “Craig, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but the entire campus heard about you beating the shit out of the Dick Brothers. No one is going to come within fifty yards of Tweek, or they know they’ll get bitten by Tweek’s guard dog.”

I felt a little bit of me swell at that, but I pushed it aside. “Whatever. Tweek and I were just going to get some lunch, so, if it’s okay with Tweek, I think we should get going before the lunch rush starts --”

“Wait!” Kenny exclaimed, wiping his hands on his apron. “I get off in fifteen minutes, I’ll come with you guys!”

I groaned in my head. I’d had pretty much enough of Kenny constantly just _being_ there.

Part of me expected the suddenly-Kenny-obsessed Tweek to agree immediately, but he hesitated, and said, “Well -- GAH! -- I thought it was just going to be me and Craig . . .”

I smiled, pleasantly surprised.

“ _Ohhhh_ ,” Kenny said, a slow smirk crossing his face as his eyes flicked between Tweek and I. I didn’t like his expression. “A date, huh? Well, never mind then, I’ll leave you crazy kids to it.”

“What? No, this isn’t a date --” I tried to correct, but Kenny waved me off.

“You don’t have to lie to me, I’ll keep your secret --”

I shook my head, irritated that he kept talking over me. “But it’s not a date --”

“Better be going, don’t want to keep your _date_ waiting --”

“GAH! Shut up, Kenny!” Tweek exclaimed, his hands balled into fists at his sides. His eyes were narrowed, his lips twisted in irritation, but, before anybody could say anything, he grabbed my wrist and started tugging me down the sidewalk. I almost tripped over my own feet at the fact that I was suddenly propelled forward by the surprisingly-strong Tweek.

“It’s almost like a gay guy can’t even have _a_ friend without some asshole making it out to be something _more_ ,” he spat under his breath, almost like he wasn’t aware of what he was saying. “One of these days, I’m just going to completely lose it, but it won’t even be my fault, because those assholes won’t fucking _leave it alone_.”

“ _Whoa_ ,” I said breathlessly, staring wide-eyed at the confidently angry expression on Tweek’s face. The initiative he took, the strength of his grip . . . There were several things that I could’ve thought in response to Tweek’s mild outburst, but the one that took precedence in the front of my mind was:

 _Fuck, that was . . . hot_. . .

Tweek let out an irritated breath. “Sorry,” he said, sounding completely unapologetic. “It’s just . . . Kenny likes to joke around. Gets on my nerves sometimes.”

I swallowed away the weird lapse into . . . whatever the fuck I had lapsed into. Like so many times before, I had decided to just pretend that it hadn’t happened, and instead focused on Tweek’s words, and how much better they made me feel about my situation. The whole _jealousy_ thing, (that had been picking obnoxiously at my patience), suddenly seemed so out of place and ridiculous.

“Well, he’s Kenny,” I said casually, relaxing my muscles which had been tense throughout my conversation with the aforementioned asshole. “He’s always liked being a dick, but he’s not so bad.”

Tweek looked at me, surprised. “I thought you hated him?”

I shrugged. “I hate everyone. Everyone includes him, but I don’t hate him _more_ than anybody else.”

“Oh,” Tweek said absently.

We fell into an easy silence, despite the fact that Tweek seemed to be deep in thought and not even remotely aware of his surroundings. Which was a little weird, because he was usually so _in the moment_ \-- he had to be on the alert at all times just in case someone wanted to kidnap him -- and, when we neared a crosswalk, because he was so distracted, he almost walked right into traffic without even looking. I instinctively yanked back on the hand that I didn’t even realize I was holding.

Tweek stumbled, but righted himself quickly enough, his chest heaving gulps of air as he stared in horror at the busy road. I could practically see his own life flashing before his eyes. But I was more distracted by the fact that I had been _holding_ his fucking _hand_ without even realizing it. And it wasn’t even the first fucking time that had happened. And, once I _did_ realize what the fuck was going on, I wrenched my hand away, holding it to my chest protectively, as if his skin had burned me. Which it might as well have, I would’ve reacted the same way.

I took deep breaths of my own, trying to ignore my heated face and the fact that fucking anybody could’ve seen us waltzing down the sidewalk, on our way to lunch together, holding fucking _hands_. But, as freaked out as I was, Tweek had just had a near-death experience, so I glanced at him briefly, swallowed thickly, and managed to say in a weak voice, “Not an outing with you unless you almost get yourself killed.”

Tweek seemed to have snapped out his stupor at my words, and shot me a glare. “GAH! Shut the _fuck_ up, Craig, I almost _died_ \--”

“It’s a good thing I saved you, then, isn’t it?” I asked, pressing the button to cross the street. “Your welcome, by the way.”

He groaned, wrapping his arms himself and staring at the ground. “Thank you. Asshole.”

I kept my eyes on the red hand on the screen across the street, and smirked to myself.

* * *

“Welcome to Applebee’s, can I start you guys off with some drinks?”

I looked up from my menu to see our waiter, standing in front of us with a pen in one hand and notepad in another. I looked him up and down, trying to decide if he was worth being polite to. He didn’t look like he as going to be too bad a guy; he was about my age, maybe a couple years older, and he was wearing a grey short-sleeve button-up, with a nametag at the corner that said, “Nikiel”, in black letters, and a pair of black slacks. He was pretty tall, but I was pretty sure I was still taller, and he had broad shoulders and big hands. His skin was dark, eyes bright, hair neatly cut, and there was a casual smile on his face, and my very first impression of him was, _Not bad_.

While I was too busy sizing up our waiter, Tweek’s squeaky voice said, “GAH! NGH! Coffee!” He must’ve made eye contact with the waiter or something, because he suddenly ducked his head behind his menu and added, “Please!”

The waiter gave Tweek a weird look, before turning to me and giving _me_ a weird look, as if I was a freak by extension. I just shrugged, as if to say, ‘It’s normal,’ before actually saying, “Orange juice.”

“Medium?” Nikiel asked, scribbling something down.

I shrugged. “Sure.”

“Alright, I’ll be right back with those in a second.” He looked up and smiled at me, before slipping his pen and pad in his apron and turning away.

I tilted my head and watched him go. “Hmm. He seems nice.”

“Yeah,” Tweek said absently, and his voice sounded so hesitant, that I was brought out of my weird stupor to look back at him. He had a small frown on his face as his eyes were rapidly sweeping up and down menu. But the extra weird part about that was he was on the drinks page.

I was about to ask him if he was okay, but I decided against it at the last second. I asked him that too much, he was probably getting sick of it. “What are you going to get?” I asked as I started flipping absently through the laminated pages of the menu. I pretended to think about what I wanted to eat for lunch, but it was all for show, because I was going to order a hamburger and fries, always and forever.

Tweek shrugged. “GAH! I don’t know . . . what are you gonna get?”

“A hamburger. And fries.” My eyes swept across his face thoughtfully. “You want to split them?”

He looked up and raised an eyebrow. “The fries?”

“Yeah.”

“Uh . . . okay?”

“Okay.”

There was a beat of silence. I leaned back in my padded chair and observed him from my end of the table. He had his concentration face on, like choosing something for lunch required the same amount of effort as his physics homework. His tongue was peeking out from between his plump lips, quirked off to the side like it had a mind of it’s own. His eyebrows were knitted, his forehead wrinkled, and his eyes flicking across the pages -- the actual food pages that time -- with the intensity of a rocket scientist designing a launch.

Finally, after a few minutes, Tweek still hadn’t decided, but had periodically tilted his head back and forth like he was weighing whether or not something on the menu was appetizing enough. I had no expectations of trying to understand his brain, but one day, fuck, I’d like to.

Our waiter came back, a mug in one hand, and a glass of orange juice in another. He set the orange juice down in front of me, and then set the empty mug in front of Tweek, who eagerly dropped the menu. His face fell when he saw it was empty, and I cracked a smile. (Only cracked. I was aware of our audience.) It seemed like Nikiel understood Tweek’s disappointment, too, because he chuckled and said, “I’ll be right back with the coffee.”

After he left Tweek narrowed his eyes at me. “That was like taking candy from a baby, and I’m mad now.”

I laughed, taking a mocking drink of my orange juice. “Sucks to be you, Tweek.”

“Yeah, it really fucking does,” he grumbling, folding his arms over his chest and glowering at his menu.

Nikiel showed up immediately after that, and poured Tweek a generous cup of coffee. “Ooookaaay,” he said slowly, ceasing his pour at just the right moment, before it spilled over. I could tell that Tweek was immediately having a much better experience here than at Olive Garden, a fact that was only reinforced by the pleased look on his face. He dove onto his coffee, his fingers wrapping around the mug, despite the billowing steam.

“Wait that’s hot --” Nikiel started, his voice alarmed, but I just rolled my eyes, gesturing to the blissful-looking Tweek.

“He’s used to it. He bleeds coffee.”

Nikiel grinned at me. “Well, in that case, just let me know if you need any topping off. Are you guys ready to order?”

The pleased look was wiped from Tweek’s face as soon as he realized that he needed to get actual food. “Uh --” and he glanced at his menu, and obviously picking the first thing he saw. “Chicken fingers!” he squealed, before wincing at his choice.

I smirked, shaking my head at him. I looked up at Nikiel and waited for him to stop writing before I said, “Hamburger. Medium. And an order of fries.”

Nikiel’s lips tilted downwards in that weird sort of ‘I’m impressed’ expression that is really fucking hard to describe in words, as he jotted my order down. “Alright. To the point. I like it.” He glanced up and smiled at me. He sure did that a lot. “I’ll just put those into the kitchen for you.” He took the menus from the table, sliding them under his arm, and he walked off with the coffee pot in his free hand.

When he was gone, I turned back to Tweek and raised an eyebrow. “So. Chicken fingers?”

He huffed, dropping his face into his hands. “GAH! I panicked!”

“I gathered that,” I said with a smirk.

After that, Tweek and I made more idle conversation about the other customers around us, rolling our eyes at bitchy fat people that sent ‘bad food’ back to the kitchen, and screaming kids that the parents seemed to be ignoring, and even two teenagers that were sucking face in a corner table. And about twenty minutes later, Nikiel returned, a single tray in hand with our orders balanced on it. I nodded absently at the sight; I didn’t know why, but I really fucking appreciated waiters and waitresses. Must be a terrible job.

“A hamburger, medium, for you,” Nikiel said, placing a plate down in front of me. “Here’s your fries to share. Aaaand an order of chicken fingers.” He stretched out his arms, before turning a smile to me and adding, “Is there anything else I can get for you guys? Ketchup for you fries?”

“Sure,” I said, catching his eye. He had dark eyes, almost black, but they were still definitely brown. And they were very warm.

He clicked his tongue without losing that probably-glued-on smile. “Be right back.”

Nikiel was gone for not even three seconds, before Tweek suddenly, without any sort of warning whatsoever, kicked me under the table. I hissed, grabbed my shin and glaring daggers at him. “Okay, what the fuck, Tweek?”

Tweek looked . . . angry? But I couldn’t figure out why, because, as far as I was concerned our outing was going _just_ fine. We got our inevitable meeting with Kenny, as well as a near-death experience, out of the way. Things should’ve been going _up_ , not down. “GAH! He keeps smiling at you!”

I let out a breath. “He’s our waiter.”

“Yeah, but he keeps smiling at _you_!”

“Maybe he saw that you’re the nervous type and didn’t want to stress you out.”

“NGH! Not the time for jokes, Craig!”

I snorted, reaching for a french fry. “You worry too much. He’s _just_ our waiter. He gets paid to smile at people. Don’t think about it.”

Tweek let out a breath, shaking his head as he nursed his coffee with both hands. “Fine.”

As soon as the word left his mouth, Nikiel returned with a glass bottle of ketchup in his hands. He put it in the middle of the table and stood back, patting his apron pocket absently. “There you are. Anything else?”

I raised an eyebrow at Tweek, but he shook his head, so I looked up at Nikiel and said flatly, “No thank you.”

“Alright, call me over if you need anything,” he said, and he went to turn away. I guess something stopped him at the last second, though, because he turned back around, and put a hand on the back of my chair. “I don’t mean to be . . . nosy, but . . . are you two . . . _together_?”

My cheeks turned a light pink, but I shook my head rapidly. You would’ve thought I’d have been used to that question by then, but it still caught me off guard every time. Especially when it was a stranger asking, under the circumstances of that day. “No, we’re not together. He’s my best friend.”

Nikiel smiled, nodding. “Good to know,” he said, patting my shoulder before walking away.

I stared after him, confused beyond all reason, but I just shrugged, turning back to my lunch.

“GAH!”

Tweek’s sudden twitch was particularly loud, and I looked up at him. He was glaring fucking . . . _swords_ at his plate. “I don’t like him,” he muttered irritably.

I rolled my eyes. “You’re worrying again. Just . . . chill out, okay?”

He let out a rough sigh, taking a comforting sip of his coffee. “He’s too . . . _grabby_. Aren’t waiters supposed to be . . . _not_ grabby?”

“Maybe he’s just the type, like Kenny --”

“Yeah, but --”

“Hey, Tweek, speaking of Kenny, what’s with your sudden need to be around him all the time?” I blurted out, changing the subject abruptly. It worked in taking Tweek’s mind off of his irrational hatred of our waiter, but the subject I had quickly chosen wasn’t exactly the _best_ one. I rolled my eyes at myself for being so careless with my words, and took a long drink of my orange juice.

Tweek jolted at the question, which was warranted and expected. Tweek never took too well to abrupt questions, or anything like that, which was why I had told him about the coat before I gave it to him. I didn’t want to spring anything that unexpected on him. He chewed on his bottom lip, averting his eyes. “I don’t know . . .” he said finally, grabbing a french fry and dragging it absentmindedly through the mound of ketchup he had put on his plate. “I just . . . like him, I guess. He’s cool.”

I snorted, staring down at my plate. “Yeah. Cool. I guess that’s a word for it. Just . . . there’s nothing weird going on, is there?”

Tweek tilted his head, looking at me with his big hazel eyes. “Weird how?”

“Weird like . . .” I waved my hand as if that would somehow explain what I was trying to say. The confused look on Tweek’s face said he had no idea what I was trying to say. I just let out a breath, shook my head, and said, “Nevermind. It doesn’t matter.”

“Are you sure?”

“Positive.”

Tweek looked unsure of my response, but took it anyway, and started eating his food, too. 

* * *

 

Once Tweek and I were done eating, it seemed like Nikiel knew immediately, because he was over at our table in a heartbeat. “Finished?”

“Yeah,” I said, tossing my napkin onto my empty plate.

“How’d it taste?” he asked, collecting our plates on his arms. On his fucking _arms_. I will never understand how they do that.

“Good.”

“That’s good. And just so you know, the red meat isn’t the only meat here that’s _good_. You should stop by again and try the dark meat.” Nikiel shot me an amused smirk. “It’s even better.” I had no idea what the fuck that meant, so I just nodded uncomfortably. Maybe Tweek was right, I remember thinking. He really was way over the top with his ‘good customer service.’

“Can we have the bill, please?” Tweek interrupted irritably, folding his arms over his chest, and staring at Nikiel with narrowed eyes.

Nikiel chuckled and nodded, saying over his shoulder, “Coming right up.”

There was a beat of only slightly uncomfortable silence after Nikiel left, in which _Tweek_ was pouting like a baby, and _I_ was trying to figure out _why_ he was pouting like a baby. It didn’t take long for me to get tired of him glaring at his empty mug, so I said, “What do you want to do when we get back to our dorm room?”

He looked up, and, even though he still did not look totally appeased, he shot me a small smile. “Go Fish?”

I tilted my head back and forth, but ultimately shook my head. “We play too much Go Fish. How about War?”

Tweek’s expression turned sheepish. “I get . . . violent when I play War.”

I barked out a laugh at the pairing of his words and his face. “What? How can you get violent playing _War_?”

He did his little giggle-laugh and rested his head in his palm. “I don’t like losing that game! I get really anxious during the battles --”

“Oh, is _that_ when you get anxious?” I said, smirking.

That would’ve been when Tweek punched me on the shoulder, but he couldn’t quite reach me, so he rolled his eyes dramatically. “Just wait, you’ll see.”

Nikiel popped up again, placing the black booklet thing on the table and saying, “I’ll just leave this here with you, and I’ll be right back.” He rushed away as casually as I’m sure he could when he heard someone calling him over.

I took the thing and looked at the bill. “Huh. Not as bad as I thought it was going to be.” I started to pull my wallet out of my front pocket when Tweek grabbed hold of my sleeve to stop me. I looked at him with a raised eyebrow, but he just shrugged and said,

“I’ll get it.”

“You don’t have to, I’m the one that offered to take you out in the first place --”

“Yeah, but you just got me this coat, and --”

I rolled my eyes. “I didn’t get you it to make you feel like you had to pay me back. I was getting sick of you freezing to death every day.”

Tweek let out an exasperated breath, reaching into his own pocket for his wallet. “Fuck, Craig, just let _me_ do something nice for _you_ for once, okay?”

I looked him up and down, but was ultimately persuaded by the firm look in his eye. “Fine,” I said, holding my hand out for him to shake. “You get the bill, I’ll get the tip.”

Tweek hesitated, but he finally nodded, taking my hand and shaking it a few times to seal the agreement. “Okay. Deal.”

Tweek put his debit card in the black holder thing and waited for our waiter to come back. I could tell Tweek was a little . . . on edge around him. Or, to be more accurate, flat out pissed around him, but I could only tell Tweek that everything was fine so many times before it was up to Tweek to feel like it was.

When Nikiel did come back, all he did was take the black book thing, give a generic, “I’ll be right back,” and then leave to process Tweek’s card. I had no idea what Tweek was freaking out over. Nikiel talked to me like a waiter talks to a customer. I’d been on the receiving end of countless waitresses and waiters like him before, it wasn’t something new to me.

Nikiel returned a minute later, handing Tweek the receipt and his debit card back. He smiled at Tweek, and then smiled at me, ( _fuck_ , he smiled a lot), and said, “You two have a nice day.”

I nodded, but didn’t say anything, and Tweek did his normal, “GAH!” thing. I tucked the corner of a five dollar bill under my plate absentmindedly. I’m pretty sure it was a 20% tip, or something around there. I didn’t really count, nor did I really care to.

I slipped my coat on, and Tweek put his on, too, but, before we left, I checked my pockets and my bookbag to make sure I had everything. I could get a little paranoid about leaving things behind in restaurants and shit, and I did _not_ want to have to come back to get my phone, or my wallet, or something. It would be a waste of time, and I hated wasting time.

We were just leaving, and were about halfway out of the parking lot, when I heard someone calling out, “Hey! Hey, wait!”

I had no reason to believe that this person was talking to me or Tweek, but the voice was so insistent that I had to stop. And Tweek seemed to have the same reaction, because he turned at the same time I did.

It was Nikiel. He was running over in our direction, still wearing his work uniform. I watched as he stopped short a couple feet from us, he chest heaving slightly as he caught his breath.

I raised an eyebrow, sharing a confused look with Tweek, before looking back at Nikiel. “What?” I asked in a flat voice.

“You forgot something,” he said, finally catching his breath and levelling a look with me.

I had already checked, but just him mentioning that made me look again. I briefly rummaged through my bookbag and patted my coat pockets, but, just like the last time I had checked, I had everything I came with. I tugged on the handles of my chullo, more out habit than anything else, and gave Nikiel a blank, unimpressed look. “No, I don’t think I did.”

Nikiel flashed me a smile and brandished a scrap bit of paper from his apron pocket, holding it out for me. I stared at it with quirked eyebrows, but purposefully empty eyes, trying to figure out what the fuck he was getting at. Before I could say anything, Nikiel grabbed hold of my hand, opened my palm, and put the paper inside. I caught a glimpse of what was on it, but it was just a bunch of fucking numbers.

“What’s this?” I asked, pulling my hand out of his, probably rougher than was socially acceptable, but he touched me, and I’m Craig. If he knew me, he should’ve expected it. I scanned the paper, and my eyes widened when I read his name in neat, almost Times-New-Roman-font letters, just above what appeared to be --

“My phone number,” Nikiel said, patting my shoulder. He let his hand rest there for a few seconds, but I glanced down at it, before glaring at him and shrugging him off.

“Why?”

His smile widened. “Why not?”

I didn’t know what to say to that, so I said nothing. I just looked at the number for a few long seconds, before looking back up to his smiling face.

“I think you’re hot,” he elaborated, his deep voice almost obnoxiously casual. “You’ve got nice eyes, and I like how you don’t give a shit about anything. It’s refreshing. And I’m single. And gay. Are you seeing a pattern here?”

My cheeks heated up the more he spoke. The moment sort of felt like a dream; I had no idea if what was happening was real or not, because _nothing_ like that had ever happened to me before, _ever_. I stared at him, trying to force my face into as emotionless an expression as possible. I still didn’t say anything.

“I’d ask you on a date now, but I got to get back to work. But, if you’re interested . . .” Nikiel took hold of the handle of my chullo, (how the fuck he managed to get so close to me, I had no fucking idea), wrapped his fingers around the string, and leaned close to my ear, muttering, his voice low, “Call me sometime.”

I shivered, simply because his breath was warm against my ear and I apparently had a weird thing about breath. I still didn’t say anything.

When Nikiel pulled back, he winked at me, before turning away and rushing back into the restaurant.

I stared after him in total shock. I had . . . never been hit on by a dude before. Not even Kenny, because he knew I’d kick his ass. I looked down at the number, skimming it to make sure it was real, before looking up at the door Nikiel had disappeared through. It was kind of surreal; like everything had passed over my head, but the solid paper in my hand told me that, yeah, it totally fucking happened.

“Jesus, Tweek, did you see that?” I asked, turning my attention to Tweek, but any other words that I might’ve said died on my lips. There was a dark scowl on his face, his cheeks bright red, and he was staring at the restaurant with narrowed eyes. He blinked a few times at my words, and turned to me, that dark scowl not wavering even a little bit.

“Yes, I fucking saw that,” he said stiffly, his voice not stuttering even a little bit.

“Dude, are you okay?” I asked, absently sticking the number in my pocket without thinking.

“GAH! You’re _keeping_ it?!” Tweek exclaimed, taking a few rapid steps back and staring in mortification at my coat pocket.

I looked down and felt the blush return to my face. “Uh . . . well, I don’t know. I probably won’t use it.”

 _"Then why are you keeping it?!_ ” Tweek screeched, his hands pulling at his hair sharply.

I sighed, taking a few steps toward Tweek and pulling his hands from his hair. “Tweek, relax. I’m not gay, remember?” I didn’t even know what I was comforting him for, because I didn’t know _why_ he was freaking the fuck out to begin with. But it just . . . seemed like the thing to say, for some fucking reason, so I said it.

“Then _why_ are you keeping it?” he repeated, his voice so shaky it sounded like he was in a car going over a bumpy road.

I shrugged, letting go of his hand and nodding in the direction of our dorm room to get him to follow me. “I’ll throw it out later.”

“Wait, but . . . you . . . but he was _hot_ ,” Tweek said emphatically, almost like he didn’t think before speaking, and he hurried after me.

I pretended not to be surprised that such blatantly gay words left Tweek’s normally-fairly-censored mouth. “Okay,” I said flatly. “But I’m not gay. Remember? It doesn’t matter if he’s hot or not.”

“So you _admit_ it?” Tweek said, his voice biting and accusing. “You _admit_ he’s hot?”

I held my arms out hopelessly. I had no idea why he was so pissed at me; I hadn’t even done anything. “Sure, I guess. I don’t know, _you_ think he’s hot!”

“That’s because he fucking _was_!” Tweek exclaimed, kicking a rock and watching as it fumbled down the sidewalk.

I let out a long breath, squeezing my eyes shut and pinching the bridge of my nose in a very Marsh-like manner. “Tweek, I have no idea why you’re pissed at me, but could you knock it off? I’m _pretty_ sure I didn’t do anything wrong.”

Tweek was quiet for a few seconds, before he sighed shakily. “GAH! NGH! No, you didn’t - didn’t do anything wrong. I . . . I’m sorry, Craig, I shouldn’t have freaked out like that.”

He sounded so fucking . . . vulnerable that I actually started to feel _bad_. “Apology accepted. Now tell me what _really_ happened?”

He shook his head. “Nothing. Just . . . just an overreaction, I’m sorry.”

I eyed him suspiciously, but decided not to press the subject. He seemed really freaked, and I didn’t want to pressure him in the middle of the sidewalk a solid ten minutes from our dorm room. “If you say so.”

After that, Tweek and I were thrust into one of the most awkward silences I think I’d ever experienced in my entire life. I didn’t look at him, he didn’t look at me, I didn’t say anything, he didn’t say anything besides his little twitchy noises, and, even though we passed by a car that had a REDRACR license plate, neither of us commented on it.

We were just passing the green where we saw Kenny and that lime-vest wearing asshole, and surprise-surprise, Kenny was _still_ there. But, yeah, I was actually really fucking surprised by that. I thought he was getting off work, like an hour before that? But it seemed he was just getting relieved, because he was slipping the apron up and over his head and handing it to some blonde chick. I guess he was telling her something funny because she giggled and punched his shoulder. I narrowed my eyes at the sight, and the whole thing just reinforced my distaste for the Irish asshole, but _Tweek_ didn’t seem to mind, (but when _did_ he), and he made this relieved sound from the back of his throat, and hurried over to the coffee shed thing. He yanked Kenny down to his height by the shirt, ignoring the look of surprise on Kenny’s face as he whispered something to him. I was too far away to hear anything, but as I made my way over to join them, I heard Tweek hiss out,

“--And we need to! _Now_!”

I raised an eyebrow. “Everything okay?”

Tweek whirled around, a panicked look of attempted-calm on his face. “Great! Just . . . Kenny and I are . . . It’s, uh -- GAH! W-well, come on, Kenny, let’s go do that . . .” Tweek swallowed, his eyes flicking in several directions at once. “That thing that -- that we were going to do!”

Kenny snorted, but allowed Tweek to pull him down the sidewalk. “Okay, ‘bye, Craig, I guess Tweek and I are going to do that thing we were going to do!”

Tweek was dragging Kenny down the sidewalk so fast, Kenny almost tripped over himself. Tweek really was a powerhouse, and normally that thought would give me some sort of amusement, but instead I frowned. For the life of me, I couldn’t figure out what the hell had just happened.

I just knew that . . . well, I guess I was walking back to our dorm room by myself.

* * *

Tweek didn’t come back until about 6:30, and he seemed, for the most part, to be feeling better. Not that I knew what the fuck was wrong anyway. But, despite our little . . . _disagreement_ over some guy giving me his number, (which I could not fucking wrap my head around), I was actually looking forward to playing War and seeing this ‘violent Tweek’ that he told me about. But instead, he canceled at the very last second to go hang out with _Kenny_.

For the _second_ time.

But the second time didn’t sting as bad as the first time did, because I was just too confused to be really angry. His departure didn’t seem as... out of place the second time. He seemed really fucking freaked. It did burn that Tweek brought his freak out to Kenny, instead of me, but I . . . trusted Tweek. Or I tried to, at least. But the truth of the matter was . . . my day was _really_ fucking weird, and I had too much shit to focus on, and I couldn’t focus on all of it at the same time.  

I spent a lot of time before Tweek got back staring at Nikiel’s phone number. It was _weird_. The whole _thing_ was weird. Because I could recognize that Nikiel was . . . attractive. No homo. He was definitely a guy who could get whoever he wanted. No homo. But he wanted . . . me? And it wasn’t like I acted interested in him, and I wasn’t particularly polite by normal societal standards. It was just . . . _weird_.

And after the little conclusion to the meal in the parking lot, all his smiles and shoulder touches started to make sense. And I kind of felt dumb.

But it also put into perspective Tweek’s anger. He said he thought Nikiel was hot . . . maybe he was jealous? He should not have been, because I’m sure if I had told Nikiel that I was straight, he probably would’ve gone straight to Tweek, because Tweek is a gay guy’s dream.

But . . . I _didn’t_ tell him I was straight. I just stared at him.

Hmm.

Whatever.

So when Tweek did eventually come back from his time out with Kenny, we ate granola bars and peanut butter sandwiches, and then . . . studied. Because we hadn’t done that yet, and, even though I had the dorm room to myself for a few hours, I was too . . . outside of myself to focus on anything seriously, so, after I tucked Nikiel’s number back into my coat pocket, I just listened to real life horror stories on YouTube, with one of my sweatshirts in front of the window to block what little light was outside, and played solitaire.

At about 9:00, we unanimously decided that to study any further would be pointless, because our brains were fried and it was too dark outside to care about anything. So, Tweek built his fort, we crawled inside, and played War.

I had to say . . . Tweek was fucking right when he said he got violent. He was practically biting his nails as we flipped the three cards down, and, if he won, he would cheer swear words into the void and laugh in my face. And when he lost he would scream swear words into the void and threaten me and my physical safety.

It was all very amusing.

We played a few rounds of War, and then played our favorite game of Go Fish, then we played some Rummy, and some Slap Jack, (which I am fucking _amazing_ at, because I don’t freak out nearly as much as Tweek does when he sees a Jack card), and we talked and we laughed and we ate chocolate.

We went to bed earlier than we normally did -- about about one in the morning -- and said our respective good nights, and I began to feel a lot better about my friendship with Tweek. We had quietly repaired it, because, even though I didn’t understand how or why, it was really fucking obvious that something was broken.

In the end, I decided I didn’t really care about that part. As long as we were good again.

* * *

Tweek and I were sitting side by side on my bed, our legs pressed together and our arms wrapped around each other’s bodies. It was really fucking obviously a dream, because, not only did my awareness start with Tweek and I hugging on my bed, but the room was . . . half there? Like passed my bed was just white space.

And when Tweek spoke, it did not sound like Tweek at all. It was Tweek speaking, I guess, but his normally high-pitched voice was replaced with a thick, _terrible_ British accent. Like that British kid that died when we were in third grade, Pap, I think? Or Pup, or Pip, or something like that. “‘Ello there, Craig.”

And, instead of responding in _my_ normal voice, I answered in the same accent: “And ‘ello to you, Tweek.”

“Bit _cold_ today, isn't it?” Tweek continued.

I nodded, answering, “Mmm. ‘Tis. Now, shall I stick my long pinky in your basement hole?”

Tweek rolled onto me, straddling my hips. He reached between his legs, placing his hand on my crotch and started to stroke me slowly. “If’n you please.”

 

Before anything could continue, I blinked my eyes open sharply, the content of my dream so fucking weird that my body basically told my brain to fuck off and forced me awake. And, because the dream was _so_ fucking weird, I had a hard time figuring out how I was supposed to feel. It was . . . _technically_ a sex dream of my best friend, but it was so fucking ridiculous that my body hadn’t even reacted to the stimulation.

“Well . . . that one wasn’t even good,” I mumbled, rubbing at my eyes as I swung my feet over the edge of my bed. If I was more awake, I would’ve probably reacted differently to my sudden desensitivity towards my constant wet dreams, but I was too out of it to make sense of it all.

“What one wasn’t even good?”

The sudden addition of my roommate’s voice made me pretty much jump out of my skin, and I looked up quickly to see Tweek, sitting up and leaning against the wall, his legs crossed in front of him and his notebook in his lap. He was staring at me curiously, taking a slow sip of his coffee. It was almost gone, and there wasn’t steam billowing from the top, so I figured it was safe to say he’d been awake for awhile.

My mouth opened and closed as I tried to think of an appropriate response. “Uh . . . just a dream. No big deal.”

Tweek’s eyebrows raised. “What was it about?”

I tilted my head thoughtfully. There was no fucking way in fucking hell that I was going to tell the full truth, so I figured a more sugar-coated version was in order. “Just, you know. Weird stuff.

“What wasn’t good about it?”

“It . . . uh, _ended_ before the good part usually happens.”

At that answer, Tweek completely abandoned both his nearly-gone coffee and his notebook, giving me his full attention. “Usually? Is it a reoccurring dream? Was it the one you had last week? What’s the good part you were waiting for?”

I shrugged, standing up and tugging uncomfortably at the handles of my chullo. I wanted nothing more than to stop talking about my dream, (especially considering I was talking to the object of my dream), but the interested expression in Tweek’s face suggested that the subject wasn’t going to change any time soon if I remained in the room. “Yes, yes, and I was waiting for . . . closure.”

Tweek quirked his eyebrows. “Closure? That’s probably the most ominous thing I’ve ever heard you say.”

I felt my cheeks heat up, and I turned my face away. “I don’t really remember the details, so I couldn’t tell you. It was more of a . . . feeling than an actual dream.” I let out a breath. “I can’t explain it.”

“No, I get it, Craig,” Tweek answered, shutting his notebook with the pen he was using still inside. “I have those all the time.”

I let out a breath. “Oh,” I said awkwardly, trying to ignore the fact that, from my end of the conversation, Tweek’s response sounded really fucking weird, so I focused on another, entirely separate part of my morning that was also really fucking weird. “What are you doing awake? It’s Tuesday, you don’t have class.”

Tweek shrugged, tilting his mug completely upside down and gulping the rest of the coffee down. Once he swallowed, he shrugged again. “NGH! I woke up, and just . . . didn’t want to go back to sleep.”

“Oh. Well, okay. I got to go, though, my professor for environmental is actually kind of cool, so I don't want to be late.” Tweek didn’t say anything in return, so I got dressed as quickly as I could, shoved my arms through my coat sleeves, and gathered the rest of my belongings in my bookbag.

“I’ll see you later, Tweek,” I said, sliding my key into my coat pocket. My fingers brushed against the phone number, but I pretended I didn’t notice, for Tweek’s sake.

“GAH! Have a nice class!” he called just as I was closing the door.

I smiled. “If that’s even possible,” I mumbled under my breath, turning away towards the stairs.

* * *

I showed up at my classroom right on time, but there was nobody in sight. I looked curiously at the door, which had a white sheet of paper taped to it, that said,

 

WIFE HAD A HEART ATTACK. NO CLASS TODAY. CHECK YOUR EMAILS FOR UPDATES ON ASSIGNMENTS.

 

I stared at it for a few seconds. There was a twinge of sympathy for my teacher but it was in passing. Everything was probably fine for him. He was one of those people that was just lucky. He had unlimited luck when it came to everything, so his wife was going to be just fine.

I was already out and about, and didn’t exactly want to go back to my dorm room, so I walked to the library and though I’d get caught up on some of the studying I’d skipped out of the day before.

The library was virtually empty, a fact that I was all too happy to discover when I plopped my shit on the nearest empty table and settled myself down. I shuffled through my bookbag, pulling out my history binder and opening it to the corresponding chapter we were on.

_Chapter 13. The Mayans_

I was immediately bored. I had no fucking use for history, and yet here I was, too early on a Tuesday morning, reading about an ancient civilization that discovered stars. You’d think that’d be right up my alley, but you’d be wrong, because the textbook hardly talked about the stars themselves. It just focused on the Mayans' diet, and the domesticated animals they tended to, and when they died out. You know. Boring shit. And usually I was all for boring shit, but not in my education. Explosions, dinosaurs, stars, planets, battles, shit like that. That was right up my alley, but there was none of that in any of my classes.

I should’ve picked them more carefully.

I wasn’t ten minutes into my spontaneous study session, when I heard Cartman’s very distinct voice exclaim, “Whoa, you look like _shit_ ,” and a stack of textbooks dropped onto the table next to me.

I hardly jumped, not feeling in my right mind enough to be scared of sudden noises. I glanced up from my history book and glared at him. “What the fuck do you want?”

He shrugged. “I just came to see how you’re doing.”

I raised an eyebrow, looking him up and down suspiciously. “Really?”

Cartman snorted. “Fuck no. I’m waiting for Kahl. He should be here in couple minutes,” he said, pulling his phone out of his pocket and checking the time. I ignored him, turning my attention back to my textbook and trying to focus on the boring-as-all-fuck words that were glaring back up at me.

“So,” Cartman said. “Where’s your boyfriend? Shouldn’t you be, like, licking his balls or something?”

I looked up and glared at him as dangerously as I possibly could. “Shut the fuck up, Cartman,” I spat. “I told you before, I’m not fucking gay, so you can quit it with that.”

Cartman rolled his eyes. “You know, Craig, I only rip into you so hard because you _react_ to me, and I think it’s funny as hell.” I bared my teeth at him, but he just continued as if he didn’t notice. “I mean, when I was still in the desperately-pining-for-my-faggy-Jewish-kinda-friend phase, if anyone even _hinted_ that I might’ve liked him more than someone hates their mortal enemy, I would’ve kicked ‘em in the _nuts_. And I totally get your whole jealousy thing. I mean, have you _seen_ Kahl? He’s the hottest thing since the sun, and he had pretty much everyone wrapped around his finger, but, for some reason, the fucking Jew chose me. I’ll never understand it, but I will recognize the fact that I don’t deserve him. And jealousy is a bitch, and I have to deal with it on a daily basis.”

I eyed him, trying to figure out where the fuck he was going with his little speech.

“So I know exactly what you’re going through. I don’t _pity_ you or anything, because it’s painfully obvious that Tweek’s got a boner for you. One of you just needs to fucking grow a pair and confess.”

“Oh, like you just ‘grew a pair’ and confessed,” Kyle said, walking passed me and leaning an arm on the table. “Craig, you _clearly_ don’t understand how simple your situation is.”

“We should tell him about us!” Cartman said, gesturing Kyle to him with a lazy hand. “That’d cheer him up!”  Without waiting for Kyle’s response, he added, “This is my favorite story, like of all time. Would you like to start, Jew?”

I had no idea what they were _cheering up_ , and I was about to get up and get the fuck out of there, but I was pretty much glued to his chair, mostly out of curiosity. Nobody ever did tell me, and it was so fucking weird, the whole thing.

“Don’t make fun of me for being a Jew, fatass,” Kyle said halfheartedly, walking around the table and finding a seat in Cartman’s lap. I wasn’t even affected by their abrupt acts of physical affection. They were pretty much always touching each other, even if it was in the middle of a fight. “And I’ll definitely start. You’ll make yourself out to be ‘big macho boyfriend,’ when really you're a mushy little bitch.”

“Ay! Don’t call me a little bitch!”

Kyle rolled his eyes. “Fine. You’re a fatass bitch. There’s nothing little about you.”

Cartman snorted. “Damn right.”

I grimaced, because _that_ was the grossest fucking thing I’d ever heard. “Please keep that to yourself.”

“Whatever,” Cartman dismissed with a wave of his hand. “Kahl, if you’re gonna go, then go.”

Listening to the 'story' of how Kyle and Cartman started butt fucking each other wasn't exactly high up on my list of things I wanted to do on a Tuesday morning, but, despite the fact that I was pretty sure I was going to regret listening, I was, like I said, curious. They were so different, so fucking different. Wendy and Stan, made sense. Wendy was a bitch, and Stan was a dick. Half the time they hated each other. The other half, they didn't. Kenny and Butters seemed to be on this whole other plane of existence that I can't even fucking put into words. And, while both Kyle and Cartman were raging dicks themselves, Kyle actually had morals, and Cartman was evil, and had killed more people than anybody else in South Park, and I was only around up until we were all fifteen. 

Kyle nodded. “Okay, so Cartman and I have hated each other since preschool. Like, _really_ hated each other. I still kinda hate you,” he added, wrapping an arm around Cartman’s neck and adjusting his position on Cartman’s lap to get more comfortable. “But the thing with Cartman and I, is that if he was in any danger at all, I would drop everything and go help him. And it’s always been like that. Like that time I saved Cartman from drowning in that cave in fourth grade, and the time Cartman saved me from the smug storm in San Francisco -”

Cartman made a scandalized noise, which came out as a grunt from the back of his throat. “You fucking _know_ about that?”

Kyle laughed. “Of course I know about that. Butters told me years ago. I just never brought it up.”

“Fucking Butters,” Cartman mumbled under his breath, before scowling and demanding, “Why the fuck didn’t you say anything?”

Kyle shrugged. “There was no graceful way to suddenly bring up the fact that you saved my entire family from certain death, so I just didn’t. Now stop interrupting. We haven’t even gotten to the good part yet.

“For a really long time, I was actually convinced that Cartman was the reincarnation of Satan. He tried to eradicate the Jews when he was nine, and he made that Scott kid eat his own parents. No human being should’ve been capable of that, but Cartman, my now boyfriend, was. And . . . to be honest . . .” Kyle hesitated. “I was kinda scared of you for a while. I would never have admitted to it, of course, because you’d never let me hear the end of it, but I just stopped fighting back for like a solid week, because I knew you could’ve made me eat my own parents if I pissed you off enough.”

Cartman hummed thoughtfully. “Then why did you start pushing back again, if you were so scared?”

“Because that was around the time when I realized that, despite the fact that I knew you hated me, you’d never actually hurt me.”

Okay, I had to interrupt at that, because even _I_ knew that statement was complete and utter bullshit. Cartman had hurt Kyle plenty of times, and that was excluding whatever the fuck happened in the four years I was gone. “Shut the fuck up,” I said, my voice almost in awe at how stupid Kyle was being. “He gave you AIDS! He tried to throw you in a pit of boiling lava because you weren’t a full-blood ginger! You just said he tried to eradicate the Jews!”

“Well, yeah, but he never actually did any of that. It was all just lame attempts to get my attention.”

Cartman snorted. “You think I actually did that because I wanted you to notice me? Bitch, you noticed me _way_ before I tried to kill your entire people.”

Kyle frowned. “Dude, your life revolved around me when we were kids,” he said in a flat voice. “And don’t even deny it, because every stunt you pulled, every prank you played, always involved me as a victim. You were a little school girl trying to get my attention.”

“But -” I began.

“No, think about it,” Kyle interrupted. “Killing non-gingers,” he said, holding up a hand and counting off on his fingers, “I was a ‘half-blood’, or whatever, and he tried to kill me first. Killing Jews.” Another finger. “I’m a Jew, and, if he got close enough, he would’ve killed me first. Not giving me his kidney, knowing that I would die if I didn’t get it fast. Trying to beat me to death with a wiffle ball bat. Always wanting me to stick my finger in his ass.” I raised an eyebrow, but decided I didn’t want to know the stories behind that last one. “All of that is great evidence of him actually wanting me dead, but if he succeeded, he would’ve regretted it the rest of his life. And you know why I know that?” He smirked smugly, staring with teasing eyes at Cartman. “Because Cartman risked his life saving me from San Francisco. He could’ve died. Butters told me that he saved me because he ‘missed having me around to rip on’. That his life felt _hollow_ and _empty_. He saved me when Manbearpig attacked, even though he could’ve just let me die on the floor of the Pentagon. I think, if it came down to it, Cartman would’ve chickened out at the last second.”

Cartman didn’t look very pleased at this explanation. “Jesus Christ, Kahl, preach much? What about all those times you snapped at me for doing dumb shit that didn’t actually involve you? Remember that Mexican kid, David?”

“You’re pronouncing it _wrong_ , fatass --”

“See? And that doesn't affect you, does it? But you get so fucking pissed off whenever I make fun of someone else other than you. And those few months that I dated Heidi? You were so jealous that you didn’t have my full attention anymore. All the guys were pining after their girlfriends that dumped them during that ‘boys VS girls’ thing, and _who’s_ picture were you staring at the whole time?”

Kyle shifted uncomfortably, before saying between gritted teeth, “ _Yours_.”

“Mine. Exactly. You were just as obsessed with me, as I was with you.” He rested his head on Kyle’s shoulder. “Now, keep going. I wanna hear the part where I sweep you off your feet in a wave of love-making passion.”

Kyle snorted, and I felt the bile in my stomach rise to my throat. “That’s hardly what happened.” He locked eyes with me, and he looked slightly exasperated, but also kind of amused. “ _I_ confessed to _him_ at a Christmas party when we were fifteen.”

Cartman chuckled. “The irony of your confession taking place at a fucking _Christmas party_ slays me every time I think about it.”

Kyle grinned. “Shut up. You know I didn’t even want to go, but Stan talked me into it. He said that he’d try to keep Cartman away from me, because, at that time, Cartman and I couldn’t hold a conversation without screaming at each other.”

“He’s seriously.”

“Yeah, I’m seriously. I was so pissed that I actually _liked_ him when I knew I probably shouldn’t have, that everything he did made me want to punch him in the face. I guess I thought that by _making_ myself hate him, my feelings would go away, but they never did. The feeling of being riled up was too addicting. The pressure building in your veins, the fire in your stomach. And only Cartman, really, can make me so angry, that my vision actually gets blurry. I didn’t even know that was possible, but it gets really hard to actually _see_ Cartman when we’re fighting.”

Cartman wrapped a possessive arm around Kyle’s waist and said, “Same, dude.”

Kyle hummed contentedly before continuing. “It wasn’t really your classic, ‘eyes locking from opposite ends of the room, time goes in slow motion’ rom com bullshit, either. We were fighting when it happened, because, even though Stan said he’d hang out with me, we only spent like five minutes together before he went off to make out with Wendy. And, because Cartman is an obnoxious dick, he immediately came over to me when he saw I was alone.”

“I just thought my faggy Jew friend needed some company.”

“Shut up, fatass. Anyway, he was sitting really close to me, and it felt amazing, but I was convinced that it wasn’t _supposed_ to feel amazing, so I flew off the handle, and starting screaming in his face about how much I hated him. I was so loud, that the entire room could hear me _over_ the speaker, and everybody stopped what they were doing and stared at me.

“I was so busy screeching complete and utter nonsense, that I didn’t even realize when I said, and I quote, ‘I try so fucking hard to hate you, but you always manage to draw me back in again! I can’t get you out of my head!’ And then I shoved Cartman back onto the couch we were sitting on, leaned in close, and laid a big, fat one right on his lips.”

“And I kissed you back fervently, lifted you into my arms, bridal style, and walked through the snow, rain, and hail to my house where I fucked you gently in my king-sized bed until you were moaning my name.”

I actually almost threw up at that, but my nerves were soothed a fraction when Kyle rolled his eyes and said, “And now for what _actually_ happened. He was so freaked out that he didn’t move, I pulled back after like five seconds, felt horror wash over me as I realized that over fifty people had seen me attempting to make out with _Cartman_ , and then I bolted and ran all the way home. I didn’t talk to Cartman for a week, and he didn’t talk to me. It was almost like it never happened.”

“But then fucking Kenny kidnapped both of us and locked us in Stan’s basement with a bottle of wine, a porno, a pack of condoms, and a huge fucking bottle of lube.” Cartman lifted his head and scowled. “I was so pissed off.”

“Yeah, the first hour was spent trying to find some way out. Seemed like Kenny thought of everything, though, because we wouldn’t have been able to escape a fire from down there. And then the second hour was _hell_. We didn’t talk to each other, look at each other, or acknowledge each other’s presence. We just sat on opposite ends of the room, waiting for someone to let us out. And then the third hour was even _more_ hell, because I couldn’t stop screaming at him for making off-handed comments about my Mom, and my brother, and stuff.”

“But do you _remember_ that fourth hour?” Cartman said, craning his neck so that he could catch Kyle’s eyes, and he smirked.

Kyle smirked back, leaning closer to him and said, “And the _fifth_ hour?”

“And the _sixth_ hour?”

“The libido of two horny teenagers,” Kyle said with a laugh. “Man, I should’ve given Kenny a thank you gift basket for that. I would’ve avoided you for the rest of my life if he didn’t lock us down there.”

“Dude, remember the look on Stan’s face when he came downstairs and saw you sucking me off?”

“If I wasn’t so horrified, I would’ve been laughing -”

“Oh I _was_ laughing -”

It took me a moment to collect myself and interrupt. They were just so fucking gross. It made me think back to when Stan warned me about asking how they started dating, and I really wished I listened to him. If I knew I would’ve learned in great detail their . . . sexual exploits, I would’ve shut my mouth before the thought even entered my mind.

“Uh . . . guys? I’m still here, you know.”

Cartman didn’t seem very affected by my announcement, but Kyle flushed bright red and cleared his throat, averting his eyes to the floor. “Um . . . sorry, Craig. Got a little carried away.”

“Yeah. I know,” I said flatly. “For the sake of my gag reflex, can we move on please?”

“Wanna hear something hot?” Cartman interjected with a smirk. “Kahl doesn’t have a gag reflex -”

Thankfully, he was stopped short by Kyle wapping him on the back of the head. “The entire world doesn’t need to know about that, fatass!” he scolded, a scowl taking over his scarlet face.

Cartman rubbed the back of his head, but I guess the angry expression on Kyle’s face amused him too much, and he started laughing. “See? Kahl’s a bitch. But he’s _my_ bitch.”

Kyle rolled his eyes irritably, wrapping an arm around Cartman’s neck again. He didn’t look like he had anything to say to that.

“And Tweek’s a spaz --”

I immediately opened my mouth to argue, but Cartman talked over me.

“But he’s _your_ spaz.”

My mouth snapped shut. I didn’t know what to say to that, so I said nothing.

“And that’s pretty much the only similarity between us and you guys. You’re never as . . . emotion-y when you’re with anybody other than Tweek. And Tweek’s not as much of a twitchy spaz when he’s with you.”

Kyle finally spoke up. “You guys are so fucking ridiculous. You couldn’t last a day without him, and the same goes for him with you --”

“If the same went for him with me, he wouldn’t be ditching me for Kenny,” I spat venomously, because Kyle’s oh-so-confident statement reminded me of every emotion that had been culminating in my very fucking soul for the past week. I had been happily distracted by several events from the past couple days, so the jealousy that I didn’t understand had kind of dulled down, but Kyle just _had_ to fucking bring it all up again. The conversation wasn't making me feel better, like those assholes claimed they were trying to do. It was making me feel _worse_ , and I hadn't even been feeling all that bad the entire day. 

It was in that moment, however, that I realized how off my tone of voice sounded, so I added quickly, “But I don’t like him any more than a friend.”

Cartman sighed, ignoring my last statement. “I don’t know why he’s spending so much time around Kenny,” he admitted. “But I know for a fact that there’s nothing freaky going on. Kenny is too obnoxiously in love with Butters. Before we found out who Kenny’s mystery fucktoy is, he would go on and on about how great his boyfriend was, without actually giving us any clues that could help us figure out who the fuck he was talking about, besides the fact that he was a ‘sexy blonde’. Maybe Kenny and Tweek are becoming better friends, I don’t fucking know. But that doesn’t change the fact that Tweek has a _raging_ boner for you. He’s fucking _tented_ , like, all the time.”

“I’ve gotta go with Cartman on this one,” Kyle said seriously. “I’ve never been one for . . . subtlety --”

Cartman snorted, but Kyle continued before he could interrupt.

“But I trust Cartman with shit like this. He’s unbelievably perceptive, and he knows what he’s talking about. Say what you want about him . . . but Cartman’s changed a lot since he was a kid, and he doesn’t fuck with actual, real life relationships.”

“Why thank you, Kahl,” Cartman said with a smirk.

Kyle rolled his eyes. “Don’t mention it. The one thing he never was able to get was Butters and Kenny, but I don’t think anyone was expecting _that_.”

“Dude, I don’t even think Butters and Kenny were expecting that,” Cartman said, snorting in amusement.

“Either way,” Kyle said, completely ignoring Cartman’s comment, “Tweek trusts you, so you should trust him back. You’re his best friend, and, from the way you’ve described him, it doesn’t seem like he makes friends easily. He’s not gonna toss you away for _Kenny_.”

I let out a breath. I was actually feeling kind of . . . better. “Okay. Good.”

“And you know, if you do like Tweek more than just a friend, that’s okay, too,” Kyle said, and I jerked my eyes to his face. He had a friendly-enough expression, but I really couldn’t take him seriously with an arm around Cartman’s neck and his legs folded in Cartman’s lap.

“But I don’t,” I defended, narrowing my eyes. I didn’t appreciate the understanding look Kyle was giving me, because, even though all these people _thought_ they knew what the fuck was going on, they didn’t, and I hated that they acted like they did. They didn’t know that for the past three days, I went to sleep knowing that my dickhole subconscious was going to invent new, and more exciting, porn centered around me and my _male_ best friend. They didn’t know that I’d been minding the dreams less and less; to the point where I let myself go completely, and just hoped I wouldn’t wake Tweek up if I talked in my sleep. They didn’t know that he was the only human being that I genuinely liked almost 100% of the time, (save the times he pissed me off), and they didn’t know how strong the pressure in my chest could get if I had any thought of Tweek being in trouble, or being sad, or getting tired of me.

They had _no fucking idea_.

And they didn’t know how confusing it was, the whole situation.

“Yeah. Right,” Cartman said, rolling his eyes.

“I’m serious --”

“We’re serious, too,” Kyle interrupted, his voice firmer than it was before, and his gaze fixed and pointed. He had a striking resemblance to his mother, who was a human being that was impossible to forget. “Denying is just going to make it worse. Take it from someone who knows. This isn’t funny anymore, it’s just sad and painful to watch.”

“There’s nothing to deny --”

Cartman snorted. “Jesus fucking Christ, Craig, get over yourself, it’s the 21st century.”

I raised an irritated eyebrow. “What the fuck does that mean?”

“It means that being gay isn’t a _mortal_ sin anymore,” Kyle said.

“Yeah, liking dick isn’t a one-way ticket to hell,” Cartman said, his voice mocking, but his words settled in my mind anyway.

I sat quietly for a few seconds, contemplating their words. I knew that being gay wasn’t a bad thing; I had absolutely no problem with gay people. It wasn’t about that. It wasn’t that I was afraid to go to hell, or that I even thought gay people went to hell to begin with. My whole life, I didn’t really care if someone was gay or not. I was more concerned with whether or not they were dickheads. Girl, guy, gay, straight, adult, kid, poor, rich, cripple, prostitute, Christian, Jew, Muslim, it never fucking _mattered_ to me. None of it did. If you weren’t a dick, then I didn’t have a problem with you. So, if I were to stumble across a good gay person, (like Tweek), then I probably wouldn’t have much against them. But if I were to stumble across a bad gay person, (like Cartman, and possibly Kenny), then there would be a problem, and, if you were to ask me, it’d be _their_ fault. The fact that they liked to fuck -- or be fucked by -- another dude was irrelevant.

So I knew being gay wasn’t a bad thing. I just wasn’t so sure I wanted that for myself.

But, want or not, it wasn’t exactly something you could _choose_. I knew _that_ part, too. It was something you were born with, something that stuck around in your subconscious until you were ready to admit it, (to yourself and everyone else). And, if you wanted to be happy, you would have had to admit it at some point, or else you would be living a lie, and Craig Tucker _doesn’t_ lie.

He doesn’t care enough to.

And the memories of my many, many dreams with Tweek, paired with the excitement I felt when I was around him, didn’t bode well for the struggling heterosexual that previously held claim over my mind. Because there wasn’t anybody else that I wanted to spend extensive time with. I got tired of most people really fucking quickly. Back in high school, I could only really hang out with my drug/alcohol dealer for a couple hours at a time before I was kicking him out of my house, or leaving his. And he was the only person I was really friends with in Middle Town.

Tweek was the only person. The only fucking person. I could live the rest of my life just talking about anything and everything with him, watching Red Racer with him, and randomly hugging at strange intervals. I totally fucking would if I saw that as an option, with no hesitation. I couldn’t imagine my life without Tweek, and I couldn’t fathom how I had functioned without him for eighteen fucking years.

When I was younger, and daydreamed about my future, whenever I pictured what my wife would look like, there really wasn’t a face that came to mind. Not even a specific celebrity that I wouldn’t have minded spending the rest of my life with. I didn’t care if she was a blonde, or a brunette, or if she had tattoos, or worked as a construction worker. I never had any preferences, (aside from the piercings thing), and I had thought that that just meant I had low expectations, but, after living with Tweek for four months, I knew that that wasn’t quite right.

Thinking about being married to a woman, kissing a woman, fucking a woman . . . it didn’t do much for me.

And I realized that it never really had.

And, with this striking revelation, I squeezed my eyes shut, gnawing painfully on my bottom lip. I wished I hadn’t realized all that shit when I was around someone else. (And not just someone else. Fucking _Kyle_ and fucking _Cartman_.) And it was then that I noticed I had been silent for long enough for it to have become weird, but they hadn’t said anything either, so I figured they were just waiting for an answer. So I said hesitantly, avoiding their eyes at all cost and tugging on the handles of my chullo, “That part doesn’t matter. It doesn’t change anything.”

“Wait, whoa, whoa, whoa, _whoa_!” Cartman interrupted excitedly. “So you _are_ gay?”

My eyes flicked open, and I kept them narrowed and aimed at my lap, wrapping my fingers around the strings of my hat absentmindedly. I could feel the heat in my cheeks, and in my ears, and in my neck, and I wanted nothing more than to shrivel into nothingness under their stares. I had never felt so... so _trapped_ in my life, like I was coated in that purple stuff in a scientific lab and shoved under a microscope for those two assholes to stare at. And I didn’t get a word in before Cartman exclaimed smugly, “I knew it! Craig’s a fudgepacker! Oh, man, wait until I tell _everyone_ -”

“Cartman, I will leave your fatass in a _heartbeat_ if you tell anyone,” Kyle threatened, his voice so dangerous that, had I been on the receiving end, I might’ve been intimidated. “This is _not_ something you fuck around with.”

“Oh, like _Kenny_ didn’t fuck around with _us_ when we came out,” Cartman said, rolling his eyes and seeming completely unaffected by Kyle’s words and tone of voice.

“That’s different,” Kyle said. “You were being an asshole about it. Craig’s not.”

I watched the exchange as discretely as I could. I didn’t like being talked about while I was in the same room, but I couldn’t bring myself to interrupt. I was having a hard enough time just not yelling and storming out.

“Alright, alright, fine,” Cartman said, waving Kyle off with a dismissive hand. “I’ll keep Craig’s little secret.”

Kyle turned to look at me, and I only held eye contact with him for a second before I was looking away again. I heard him sigh. “I was almost disowned when I came out. My mom didn’t like that she wouldn’t get any biological Jewish kids, and almost kicked me out of the house if I didn’t ‘stop this nonsense.’ So, I understand. I do. I’ll help you with whatever you need.”

I stared at him, a heat spreading through my veins. His words didn’t help me at all.  

“You should talk to him about it,” Kyle continued, obliviously. “And if you want an outsider’s perspective, without all the bullshit, I’ll tell you exactly what I think: Tweek likes you. A lot. And I know you hear it from everybody else, but I’m serious. All taunting aside, I’m telling you that if you were to ask him on a date as soon as you get back to your dorm room, he _would_ say yes.”

I’d been told that so many times that I was starting to lose my cool. In my mind, it was the equivalent of the guys repeatedly calling me gay; I was about to snap. People had no fucking idea what was going on; they weren’t in the dorm room with Tweek and I when it was just Tweek and I, so they didn’t fucking get it, and I’d decided it was really fucking presumptuous of them all to think they did. I shook my head again, throwing all my shit into my bookbag hastily, hopping to my feet, and crossing the main part of the library as fast as my long legs would carry me. “I’m _leaving_ ,” I called stiffly over my shoulder.

Cartman smirked, waving sarcastically to me as I left. “Make sure you get affirmative consent before you shove your dick in his ass; it’s gay etiquette. Formalities --”

“Will you shut the _fuck_ up, Cartman?” was the last thing I heard before I slammed the front door of the library behind me.

* * *

I had decided I wasn’t in the mood to go back to my dorm room, so I just . . . walked, and figured I’d go wherever I went, if that makes any sense. I’m not sure how I got there, but I found myself pacing in the alley between the two science buildings, the same place that I had saved Tweek all those weeks ago. It was a reminiscent place, I guess, not one that I found particularly comforting, but whatever.

But it wasn’t like I was being _comforted_ at fucking all, because my brain was in a heated argument with itself, and it was driving me fucking insane really fucking quickly. Because one side was calm and collected, while the other was freaking the fuck out, and, when both sides are in the same person, that’s never good.

As I paced to the right, the calm voice said, _Okay, so . . . maybe you_ are _gay --_

I growled angrily at my own thought. _Shut the fuck up, you’re not_ gay _._

_Then how the fuck do you explain the whole --_

_It’s just a . . . a fluke. You spend so much time around one person, you’re bound to_ \--

_Bound to what?_

_Bound to . . . get confused._

I tugged on one of the handles of my chullo harshly.

_Well you’re fucking confused, alright. But you’re only doing it to yourself, if you just fucking chill out for three seconds, then  --_

_Then what?_

_Then you might realize that it isn’t so bad._

I stopped my angry pacing abruptly, and leaned my back against the brick building, dropping my face into my hands.

 _I_ know _it’s not so bad --_

_Clearly you don’t, if you’re so freaked out about it --_

_That’s different --_

_How?_

_Because it’s_ ME _!_

I actually jolted by how loud that last thought was. It was like a tiny person fucking screamed in my brain, and it had completely caught me off guard. But it made sense. I had always thought that way; gay people weren’t a plague to society, like so many people thought. They weren’t going to hell because they liked rubbing dicks with another dude. But I didn’t want that. I didn’t _want_ to like guys. I wanted to be _normal_ , I wanted to be that boring next-door neighbor that had a golden retriever named Spot and had an equally boring wife that would watch Grey’s Anatomy and Wheel of Fortune with me and go to sleep early and ignore everybody on our street, and liking other guys did not ensure that . . . dream? to come into being, and that pissed me off. Because even though, the more I thought about it, I guess I didn’t really _want_ that future, I did know for sure that I wanted the illusion, the comfort of an illusion of other people’s happiness, I didn’t want to deal with all the fucking _pressure_ \--

I stopped. I looked up at the brick building in front of me with a purposefully blank expression. I felt the majority of my agitation ebb away. Because:

 _Jesus, calm down . . . you sound like Tweek_.

I let out a breath, feeling the corners of my lips tilt upwards at the thought. “Jesus, Tweek, is that how you feel all the time?” I mumbled, my head hitting the building behind me. The panicked feeling, the all-consuming feeling that everything was going to shit, I couldn’t imagine that being my main emotion. But that almost might’ve been because that was the first time I’d felt that way. Tweek was born like that.

I just . . . I couldn’t imagine.

“Uh . . . Tweek . . .” I sighed out his name, sliding along the building so that I was sitting in the snowy grass. I knew that I was going to freeze, and that I’d be walking around with a soaked ass until I got back to my dorm room, but I was too mentally exhausted to keep standing.

“Maybe . . .” I muttered, staring at the graying sky. It was too light to see stars, but I knew that even when nighttime came, there were just too many clouds. “Maybe . . . if it was Tweek . . . it wouldn’t be so bad.”

It wasn’t like I had any female callers. That I knew about. That I approved of.

And it _also_ wasn’t like I was a stranger to a borderline-unhealthy fixation on Tweek. I had already accepted _that_ part of me. The part that liked the thought of my _subconscious_ making out with Tweek. I knew making out with Tweek was nothing the _conscious_ me would do, and just the thought had always made a shiver run up and down my spine.

I could never put a name, or even a feeling, to that shiver. But . . . maybe I was starting to.

I ran a hand down my face, letting my palm rest on my lips. “That guy is going to be the death of me,” I said, my voice muffled. “The fucking death of me.”

* * *

I finally got my shit together about fifteen minutes later, and decided to make my way back to my dorm room. My heart was light, but my head was heavy. I still had a long way before accepting the whole thing, but I knew for sure that . . . if I _was_ gay . . . which I . . . _could’ve_ been, (it started to seem more and more like the case the longer I thought about it), it would definitely be for Tweek.

The climb up the stairs took more out of me than it normally would have, but, when I finally got to the top, I had to take a deep breath to prepare myself to face Tweek. I was about to put my key into the lock when I heard a boisterous voice that _didn’t_ belong to my best friend saying with a laugh, “Yeah, I could tell.”

I narrowed my eyes, trying to place the voice, when Tweek answered him, in a shaky voice, “Just . . . GAH! -- remember, Craig can’t know about this.” He sounded like he was trying to intimidate whoever he was talking to, but he was doing a fucking terrible job, and yeah, wannabe-hardcore-Tweek is adorable as fuck, (something I wasn’t afraid to admit anymore), but I was more hung up on his words. _Craig can’t know about this_. Sure, it could’ve been something harmless, because I figured Tweek wouldn’t keep anything actually serious from me. He told me everything, to an extent. But I was extremely fucking curious, so I leaned against the door, and listened in.

“I’m serious, Kenny.”

My eyes narrowed, and a sudden white-hot jealousy flared in my chest. So sudden that it actually took me off guard. Because of _course_ he was talking to Kenny. Who the fuck _else_ would he be talking to? He practically _lived_ in Kenny pants. Whatever pleasant resolution I had found in the alley dissolved rapidly into that burning that I’d been feeling every once in a while, whenever Tweek would wave goodbye to go hang around Kenny’s apartment to drink coffee and play poker and suck each other’s dicks.

I took a deep breath, trying to reason with myself as soon as that last thought had entered my brain. I had never acted like such a bitch in my entire life; there could’ve been a logical explanation for the conversation Tweek and _Asshole_ McCormick were having about keeping a secret from me.

Kenny’s voice even had the audacity to have an eye roll in it. “Yeah, yeah. I don’t see why you can’t just tell him. I mean, he’s your best friend.”

“Exactly,” Tweek said emphatically. “He’s my best friend. That _doesn’t_ mean I can tell him this. That’s the exact reason why I _can’t_ tell him about this. I’m lucky Craig didn’t _hate_ me for being gay, but wanting to be _fucked_ by a guy, and being in _love_ with a guy are two totally different things!”

As soon as the words left Tweek's mouth, my heart stopped and my breath caught in my lungs. But only a second later, a heavy weight settled on my chest, pressing almost painfully. Because there was no way in fuck Tweek was talking about _me_ , (I had no reason to believe that, and I couldn’t let myself hope anything, not in the face of Tweek’s private conversation), so that meant that Tweek was in love with someone, that . . . _wasn’t_ me. And, after my half-formed revelation, I hadn’t expected to be _rejected_ so suddenly. It made my heart do a series of painful somersaults, and my stomach felt hollow at the realization that initial pain was only going to get worse the more time I had to think about it.

There was a beat of silence before Tweek spoke again, his voice quieter and weaker, with a striking resemblance to a whimpering child, “Please don’t tell him.”

He sounded so sincere. There was that ever-present jealousy that fucking McCormick was in on some big secret in Tweek’s love life, but also a sadness that . . . I mean, fuck, my best friend didn’t actually trust me. And I guess I could’ve made the argument that Tweek trusted me enough to come out to me first, but that argument fell to pieces when I remembered he _also_ trusted Butters and _Kenny_. 

And now he was in love. And -- presumably -- only Kenny knew about it. And I had a sick feeling in my gut that I knew _who_ Tweek was in love with.

Kenny huffed. “Fine. I won’t tell him. But if you keep this from him, it’s only going to get worse, for you and him. And probably me, too. You said he’s already getting suspicious, right?”

Tweek sighed. “Yeah . . . whenever I can’t hang out, because you and I are getting together instead, he gets really . . . weird. Moody.”

I hadn’t realized Tweek noticed that. I mean, I could tell he knew I wasn’t exactly _pleased_ with it, but I didn’t think the oblivious spaz had made the connection.

There was a pause before Kenny said in a deadpanned voice, “. . . You _know_ that that’s just because he --”

“GAH! D-don’t even say it out loud!” Tweek said loudly. “I know it’s not true, so just . . .” Tweek sighed roughly. “Don’t say it out loud.”

“Dude, Tweek, you are _so_ in denial --”

Tweek’s voice was full of exasperation as he spat out, “ _Kenny_ \--”

“Alright, alright, fine,” Kenny said dismissively. “I won’t bring it up again, I swear. I still think you should tell him, but it’s up to you.”

I begged, prayed, that Tweek would make some announcement that he had changed his mind, and that he was going to tell me after all, but he just fell silent. I waited a few more seconds, but it didn’t seem like Tweek had anything else to say, so I straightened up, feeling my head rush with the knowledge that my best friend actually did trust Asshole McCormick more than he trusted me.

I took a few steps away from the boring, white door, gnawing on my bottom lip as I tried to figure out what to do. There really wasn't much I could do. There was no way in _fuck_ that I was going to go inside of that fucking dorm room. My pounding heart wouldn't be able to take it. So slowly turned away, and  robotically walked down the hallway, _away_ from my dorm room, without thinking about where I was going. I just . . . I _needed_ to go away.

* * *

When I went back to my dorm room that night, after having sufficiently calmed down enough to be around him without doing/saying something I was going to regret, it was very late. The sun was down, the time for eating dinner had came and went hours before, and I had gotten approximately fifty texts from Tweek asking where I was.

I didn’t answer him. And, because he kept texting me to come back to the dorm room, I figured he hadn’t come to look for me, either. Not that I would’ve expected him to, he probably thought I was kidnapped.

No, I _knew_ he thought I was kidnapped. He stated that in more than half of the texts he sent me, all of which were riddled with spelling errors and random exclamation points. All of which I totally ignored.

So, when I did eventually show up, Tweek immediately bounded up to me, a wide, relieved smile on his face. “GAH! Craig! You’re back!” Tweek exclaimed happily. Normally, the smile that was plastered to his face would’ve sent pleasant tingles down my spine, but that time it just made me feel worse. “Where were you today?”

I turned my back to him, plopping my bookbag on my bed and shuffling through some papers, trying to make it seem like I had things to do. “Just, you know.” I waved my hand in a circle, but didn’t elaborate more than that.

“Oh. Uh, okay,” Tweek said, confusion in his words and tone. “Well, did you want to play Go Fish or something? I could teach you poker; Kenny’s a great teacher, I’m getting kind of good at it!”

I bared my teeth at the mention of Kenny. I had hoped I could’ve had at least five minutes without Tweek bringing up that cheating asshole. “I already know how to play,” I said shortly, keeping my head down.

There was a bit of an awkward pause before Tweek said, “GAH! Okay. Well, we could play then? When Kenny and I were walking around yesterday, I got this really cool deck of cards that have presidents on them and guess who’s on the joker cards?” Tweek let out this weird little breathy laugh, like he was nervous of something. “Donald Trump!”

“Yeah, that’s really funny, Tweek,” I said flatly, tossing my bookbag onto the floor. “But I’m not in the mood.”

Another pause. “Are you okay?”

“Fine.”

“You don’t sound fine.”

“Well, I am.”

“Are you sure? Did something happen?”

“No.”

“If something’s wrong, I can help --”

I glanced at him over my shoulder, my eyes purposefully void of emotion. “No, you can’t, Tweek, because nothing’s wrong.”

Tweek’s eyes widened. It’d been awhile since I’d talked to him that way. Not in that soft, soothing, casual voice that I’d adopted when I was around him, but that cold, indifferent voice that I reserved for everybody else.

I sighed, turning away again. “I’m going to sleep,” I said blankly.

Tweek was quiet for a few seconds before saying in a broken voice, “Okay. I hope you feel better.”

I groaned, running a hand down my face. Why did he have to be so fucking . . . _Tweek_ ? And he used to be _my_ Tweek, I used to be his favorite person, and now he liked _McCormick_ more than me. He trusted _McCormick_ more than me, he was in fucking _love_ with fucking _McCormick_ , that cheating dickhole that fucking _knew_ what he was doing but was fucking doing it anyway --

I shed my coat irritably, tossing it carelessly on the floor behind my bed. I thought I had given myself time to calm down, but I apparently hadn’t.

As I continued to change into my pajamas, I took long, deep breaths. I had to tell myself over and over again, that it wasn’t Tweek’s fault, and that I shouldn’t be a dick to him because he was having . . . _feelings_ that I didn’t approve of. Because I did _not_ fucking approve of his apparent feelings for Kenny, because all Kenny was going to do was break Tweek’s heart, and that adorable asshole did not need his heart broken, on top of all the other shit in life that seemed to be out to get him.

But the other thing, I thought, climbing into my bed and pulling my blankets up to my chin as I faced the wall, was that Tweek already seemed to know what was happening, too, and that there was something wrong with it, because he wasn’t willing to tell me. He was _begging_ Kenny not to tell me, and for what? What did Tweek think I was going to do? Did he think I was going to be mad at him? Did he think I was going to stop being his friend over it?

Because let me tell you . . . I would’ve tried as hard as I fucking could to keep him.

But Tweek lied, and Kenny was a lying bastard, and what was I?

Someone that was dropping Tweek, that’s who. Because, realistically, if you wanted to get technical, I knew I had . . . some semblance of . . . _more-than-friends_ , feelings for him. Enough for me to get insanely jealous at the thought of Tweek waltzing into the sunset with someone _other_ than me. And I didn’t know if I was capable of not acting like a bitch and ruining my friendship with him, anyway, even if I decided to slowly distance myself from Tweek. Or just rip the bandaid off and flat out tell him to fuck off.

But that was another thing I didn’t think I was capable of. Being a dick to Tweek. It was _hard_ being a dick to Tweek, really fucking hard. It was hard enough acting like I didn’t care, but actively being mean?

As these rapid thoughts went shooting through my head, a light from the other side of the room turned off, and I heard Tweek’s still-broken voice whisper, “Goodnight, Craig.”

I pretended I didn’t hear him.

* * *

The next morning was . . . really fucking awkward. I didn’t talk much to Tweek, not even when I woke him up. I just threw a pillow at his face and hoped for the best. He yelled at me for it, but I just shrugged and gave a short, completely insincere apology.

I walked him to his class, like I always did, but I said nothing the entire way. Every time he tried to start a conversation, I would just grunt, or give one-word answers. And when we got to his building, I gave him a short, “Seeya after class,” and left immediately.

I knew full well how much of a bitch I was being, but I actually, literally could not help it. And it was part of the . . . _get rid of Tweek before you are forced to watch him and some guy make out and go on dates and shit_ plan. It was selfish. It was immature. But it was my first instinct; protect yourself at all costs from having your heart ripped to shreds. I had become attached and I sensed that maybe my attachment was going to be severed without my consent, and I would _not_ fucking stand for that to happen. But the way Tweek spoke the day before -- paired with _who_ he was speaking to -- made me think that the situation was out of my hands, like there was nothing I could do to get Tweek back on my side. Because I had tried to do that. I tried to get his attention all the fucking time, but it never seemed to work. He was in love with McCormick, it was so fucking obvious.

And the more I thought about it, the more I realized that just the idea of it fucking _killed_ me inside.

I couldn’t focus during class, and it seemed to drag on forever, while also going by ridiculously fast. By the time we were dismissed, I almost forgot to pick Tweek up, and I left my building a few minutes later than I normally did, and I didn’t hurry to get to him. I knew he was going to be just fine; apparently the whole school was scared of me. And, just like I thought, he _was_ fine, just standing by the brick building, his trembling arms clutching his textbooks to his chest and his eyes fixed to his feet. _This_ was the Tweek that I met back in September; _this_ was the Tweek I hadn’t seen in a very long time.

I walked up to him, and, when he caught my eye, a brief smile came to his face.

It fell almost immediately. He turned his eyes to the ground. “GAH! NGH! EHH! Did your teacher keep you after?” Tweek asked nervously, fiddling with his textbook.

“No,” I said blankly. “Lost track of time. Ready?”

Tweek let out a long, shaky, (very shaky), sigh, and said reluctantly, “I’m going to hang out with Kenny.” And he sounded like he actually fucking felt _bad_ about it. He didn’t feel _bad_. I had discovered a pattern in Tweek’s little excursions with Kenny. He _always_ sounded sorry, but he went and did all this shit anyway.

I forced my face not to react. I was already planning my afternoon without Tweek. I would probably just end up watching a shit-ton of YouTube videos. I was in the mood for something . . . destructive. A simulation of earth getting struck with a giant meteor? What would happen if a black hole entered our solar system? How large a solar flare would have to be to wipe out life on earth as we know it?

“Okay,” I said, adjusting my bookbag on my shoulder.

“Tweek!” Kenny called from the sidewalk across the street. “Over here! Let’s go!” I glanced at him, saw that he was waving at Tweek with his entire arm, but I turned away immediately after. I didn’t want to look at him.

Tweek was staring at me, I could feel it, but I didn’t want to look at _him_ , either. So I stared at the sky, taking note of the fact that it was going to rain again. It would make a lot of the snow go away. Or just turn it into that gross slush that’s really fucking hard to walk in.

Tweek took a few steps away, and, just as I was about to head back to my dorm room, he stopped and said, “Are you _sure_ you’re okay?”

I cleared my throat. “Fine.”

He sighed deeply. “You’re not fine, Craig. Don’t lie to me, did something happen yesterday?”

I shook my head. “Nope. If something happened, I probably would’ve told you.” I glanced up at him sharply, feeling a surge of irritation interrupt my forced apathy. “Like you’d tell me if something happened with _you_ , right?”

Something I didn’t recognize flashed through Tweek’s eyes, but it was gone a split second later. “Yeah. You’re right, I would.”

A distant throb of probably pain, shot through my chest, but I cleared my throat again to try to make it go away. “Then there you go. You should probably leave. You don’t want to keep Kenny waiting. He’s not known for being patient.”

Although I refused to look at him, there was clear hesitation on Tweek’s part, but he let out another sigh, and started to cross the street. “I’ll be back later,” he mumbled to me.

* * *

My afternoon passed as I’m sure you expected it would.  I layed in bed, ate some granola bars, and binge-watched YouTube. Learned some useless facts that will not help me at all in my lifetime, but were still kind of cool to hear about. Apple seeds have small amounts of cyanide. The Mariana Trench is almost 11,000 meters deep. Gandhi sucked. Mandela didn’t.

It was about 9:30 and Tweek still wasn’t back yet. And I was so . . . _done_ with fucking everything that I decided to just go to sleep. Skip studying. Skip waiting for him to show up. Skip that stupid mantra I told myself to stay awake until at least midnight.

But it was easier said then done. I just fucking layed there. With the lights off. Under my nice warm blanket in a pair of nice sweatpants. But I still couldn't get to sleep. I must’ve just stared at a wall for a really fucking long time, before I heard the dorm room door open.

I tensed, but pretended to be asleep. Anything to avoid any possible interaction.

Seemed like Tweek had different plans, because I heard him plop some shit on his bed, I heard him unzip his coat and drop it onto the floor, and I heard his footsteps near my bed.

“ _Craig_. . .”

I huffed quietly, but didn’t move.

“GAH!  _Craig_!” Tweek insisted, his voice louder as he prodded my back with his finger.

I groaned and shifted away from him, trying desperately to still pretend like I was sleeping.

There was a few seconds reprieve from Tweek’s ‘wake-up tactics’, before a light switched on, and he “GAH!”’d particularly loudly. I tried to ignore both, but then he smashed a fucking pillow down hard on my head. I made a weird sputtering noise at Tweek’s unexpected, but very effective, method, and, even though I was already awake, I was still pissed that he went to that obnoxious of extremes. I was about to yell at him, when he commanded in an angry voice,

“Fucking _talk_ to me, man!”

“What the fuck is your problem?” I yelled, sitting up straight and scowling at him in as dangerous a way as I could manage. It’s so fucking hard to be a dick to him, but I swear to God, he was being the dick first. “I’m trying to sleep here!”

“No!” he shouted back, and I fell silent at the tone of his voice. He’d never yelled at me before. At least, not _yelled_ yelled. He was always too afraid to, like he thought I was either going to beat the shit out of him, or never talk to him again or something. And for some reason, he actually cared enough to want to prevent that from happening. “ _You’re_ the one with the fucking problem!”

“How do _I_ have a problem?” I said, recovering from my shock and narrowing my eyes at him. “I’m acting like I always do. I don’t give a shit about any _one_ , or any _thing_.”

“You give a shit about _me_!” he yelled, and, beyond his anger, there was almost a hidden panicked expression that he was trying to hide, but, even though I noticed it, I just couldn’t stop. I was so pissed at him, really, _really_ super pissed at him, even though I knew deep, fucking _deep_ down that he didn’t actually deserve any of the shit I was throwing at him. But just looking at him pretty much made me blow a gasket.

So I kept yelling at him. “No, I don’t!”

He sucked in a breath. “Yes you do! You _told_ me you do! Why would you lie about that?”

“I lied about that because I’m a dick!” I yelled, throwing the blanket off my body and jumping to my feet. “I don’t care about you, or your anxiety, or the fact that you have to drink four pots of coffee a day in order to function like a normal human being!”

There was pretty much steam blowing out of his ears. “You’re lying!”

“No, I’m not!”

“Yes, you are! You’ve been treating me so nice all this time, why would you do that if you don’t care?!”

I sputtered, trying to come up with the best reply to a question I hadn’t anticipated. “I . . . Tweek, if you think I treat you any better than any of the other dumbass dickholes that I have to deal with every day, then you’re fucking delusional.”

“But I’m _not_ just another dumbass dickhole!” Tweek exclaimed, his voice cracking. “You care about me, I _know_ you do --”

“You think I care about you?” I spat, my eyes narrowing. “You think you actually _matter_ to me? Because you fucking don’t, you . . . you stupid, needy _faggot_!” I ignored the flicker of hurt that crossed his face. “You’re not special, Tweek! You’re not an exception, and you’re _not_ my best friend!”

He looked like I’d just punched him in the gut. For just a few seconds, we stared at each other, and the more time I had to take in his expression, the heavier my stomach began to feel. Damn, I’d never seen him that heartbroken before. Not even when he told me about his parents and about him being gay. He looked like how I felt when Stripe died when I was sixteen.

My words came rushing back to me, and a deep regret I’d never felt before came crashing in my stomach. I took a step forwards, my irrational anger having slipped away. “Tweek -” I said softly, reaching out to him.

I didn’t get very far, because he launched a fist back, and socked me right in the jaw. I stumbled, completely taken aback by how strong he was. I remember, back when I first met him, thinking he was such a weakling, who couldn’t take a ten-year-old girl in a fight, but holy _shit_ did he prove me wrong. I caught myself before I completely fell over, but my entire side of my face immediately started throbbing, and I looked at him with wide eyes. “ _Tweek_ \--”

But Tweek howled like a mad man and kicked me in the shin, and, when I bent over to clutch the pre-bruise, he grabbed hold of my head and kneed me in the nose. I hissed in pain, falling back onto my bed and trying to focus my attention on what coming wound throbbed the most. He really, _really_ was stronger than he looked, goddamn.

“You don’t get to say that!” Tweek screeched loudly, and, when I looked up at him, he was pacing wildly, his hands pulling so hard on his hair that whole clumps came out. He didn’t react to this, though, he just let the strands of hair fall to floor, and resumed his grip on his head. “Not you! You can’t do this to me!”

I rubbed at my nose, trying to massage the pain away, and said, in as calm a voice as I could muster given the situation, “Tweek, I didn’t --”

He rounded on me, and I had most definitely learned my lesson on talking out of turn when Tweek was having a complete meltdown. “No! This isn’t fair! You weren’t supposed to do this! _Not you!_ ”

I opened my mouth to say something, but the almost psychotic look in Tweek’s eyes told me that that wasn’t such a good idea. He stared at me for a few long, unbearable moments, and I stared back, waiting to see if I was going to be hit again, or if he was going to leave, or . . .

Fuck, it had been a while since I couldn’t predict Tweek’s next move.

Finally, he let out a long breath and squeezed his eyes shut. He stayed like that for another few more seconds, his hands balled into fists at his sides and his entire body vibrating. His cheeks were flushed, but they weren’t wet. They were remarkably dry, actually, but I kept my eyes fixed on his closed eyes, hoping against hope that he wouldn’t start crying.

Eventually, he did open his eyes, and the gaze that he leveled at me was somehow empty and filled to the brim with anger at the same time. “You don’t want to be my best friend?” he said quietly, his eyebrows flattening out. “ _Fine_. I just think it’s really sad. You know, I actually _trusted_ you. I actually thought you were a decent person, who actually cared about somebody, _anybody_.” His eyes narrowed, and a few tears escaped the corners, but he looked way too angry to really start crying. “But I was wrong. You’re just like everyone else.”

He paused, his eyes sweeping my body up and down. “No,” he said, his voice even quieter than before. “No, you’re _not_ like everybody else. You’re _worse_. You made me like you. You made me think we were such good friends that I could confide my secrets to you, without worrying about you taunting me, or making me feel _wrong_ , or spreading it around to everyone. Maybe you didn’t tell anyone. But the fact that you were pretending to be okay with it . . . you lead me on. You _betrayed_ me.” He bared his teeth. “And I _hate_ you!”

I stared at him with wide eyes, trying to absorb his words as quickly as possible before he had a chance to storm out.

He . . . hated me.

My Tweek . . . _hated_ me.

And the worst part was, I had no room to deny it. I had no room to blame him for overreacting to some misunderstanding. There was no way for me to spin the argument in my favor, not that I would have anyway, but at least I could've taken comfort in the fact that _maybe_ it wasn't _entirely_ my fault.

But it was. I did it. I made him hate me.

But . . . fuck, he _should’ve_ hated me, and if he didn’t, then I would’ve been seriously worried about him. Because everything he said . . .

He was right. He was totally fucking right. I felt my eyes begin to water, but I blinked the tears away, refusing to give in to that in front of someone else. If I no longer had my pride, at least I could keep some dignity.

Tweek glared at me for a few more seconds, before he turned away quickly, grabbing his coat from the edge of his bed, and starting to slip his arms into the sleeves. But, halfway through the process, he stopped dead in his tracks and stared at the coat itself, and, a few seconds later, he growled and wrenched it off of him, throwing it away like it was on fire. He shook his head rapidly, making a move towards the door, but, before he could even touch the knob, I called out to him,

“Wait, Tweek! Where are you going?”

He glanced over his shoulder at me. “I’m going to Kenny’s apartment. Maybe _he_ can be my best friend.”

Before I could say anything, Tweek slammed the door shut, and he was gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well... there you have it.
> 
> Just a quick little question, too: For the next three chapters, there will be a focus on another male character, (not giving any details of how, because, depending, the role will be different). I have two options that I cannot chose between, so I'm leaving it up to you guys:
> 
> I can either continue using Nikiel, or I can introduce Travis Smith, Craig's drug/alcohol dealer from high school. Let me know in the comments, and the popular opinion will be included. In the grand scheme of the story, both characters won't change anything; the end game is the exact same, it's just the next three chapters that I will need to alter. So, keep that in mind! It'll change some stuff, but the rest of the chapters will be exactly the same. I have the story planned either way, so it would take the same amount of time for the next chapter upload. 
> 
> (Please answer as soon as possible, though, I will need to keep writing either way, and I already take long enough to update! Sorry about that, by the way, but such is life.)
> 
> By the way, I designed Nikiel to be a character to be hated, but... I actually kind of like him? It was an accident, but let me know about him, too! I'm curious what you guys think!
> 
> EDIT: I know there wasn't a whole lot of time, but I did get 16 responses, so that was enough to go off of, I think. Because I do have a LOT of writing to do, and I don't want to keep you guys waiting for a ridiculous amount of time again. Nikiel won 10-6, so Nikiel will be the returning character! That's not to say that Travis won't make an appearance later on in the story, (not too sure about that yet), but he won't be as central of a character. Thanks for the response, and I'm sorry to the people who said Travis! I really hope you guys like it, though!


	15. Tweek's Very Own Chapter: Part I

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, this chapter, and the next chapter, were originally one, but it was so long, that I decided to chop it in. 
> 
> And surprise! It's from Tweek's POV! There were just so many things that had happened recently that you only got to see from Craig's perspective, so I thought a fresh view was cool? I don't know, I hope it goes over well!
> 
> I hope you guys like it!

The thing about Craig Tucker is that he is _the_ biggest asshole in the entire world.

I’m not even joking.

I realized this fact the first time I ever met him, when he found me under my bed, and he just stared at me with these black-hole eyes, that weren’t _really_ black, but really, really blue, like the ocean, so I guess maybe they were like ocean-deep eyes, which makes just as much sense as black-hole eyes, maybe even more.

He was condescending, patronizing, apathetic, and just a dick in general. But I was relieved at the same time, because condescending, patronizing, apathetic, and a dick in general pretty much was the best case scenario as far as I was concerned, because he also could’ve been a wrathful demon possessing a human form with the intent to suck the life from me if I got too close, so I figured I got lucky with Craig.

Besides, he also didn’t seem like the type to bring girls around every weekend, which was another thing I was worried about, because that would mean I would have to find some other place to stay for the night, and I didn’t really expect to make friends, so that ‘other place’ would probably mean a park bench, or the bathroom of a 24 hour McDonald’s.

But then something happened. He turned out to be one of the biggest geeks in the entire world, and had seen every episode of Red Racer a shitload of times, and that pretty much destroyed my first impression of him just being this concrete wall of emotion, which is something that him and I will always differ about, because he can hide his emotions behind his blank expression and unnerving stare, but I can hide my emotions behind my emotions, which is surprisingly effective if you’re never tried it before. With Craig, nothing’s ever wrong, and with me, something’s always wrong, so nobody would ever worry.

That’s genius, man.

And then something else happened. I found I actually _liked_ being around him. I mean, he was still a condescending, patronizing, apathetic dick in general, but I started to mind this less and less, until I actually really liked him for who he was, which was weird, because if I _liked_ him and could handle being around him for _very_ extended periods of time, that meant I wasn’t _afraid_ of him, and I was afraid of _everyone_. And I had known Craig’s type before, back at my high school in Denver, so, theoretically, Craig should’ve been the scariest person at our college, (besides maybe Cartman, although I guess that goes without saying), but he wasn’t. He was the _least_ scariest, or the least _scary_ , or whatever the proper grammar is; I was always terrible at English. I started calling him my friend in my head, but I would always yell at myself for that, because there was no _way_ the biggest asshole in the entire world would consider _me_ his friend. A friend in my mind was someone who would help me out if I needed help, and who I wouldn’t mind being around, and who I would protect with everything I had in my five-and-a-half foot body, which wasn’t a whole lot, but still.

Craig had become shelter for me. He would never be too far from me, wherever we went. The longest we went without each other was when we had classes, or when we were sleeping, or when I went to hang out with Kenny, (which, really, I didn’t do a _whole_ lot), and other than that, if you wanted to find me, though I couldn’t think of a single person who would, you would just need to locate this navy-chullo-wearing giant.

But then something else happened. I accidentally blurted out the fact that I thought Craig was my friend, and, instead of hitting me, or pushing me to floor and stepping on my face, or screaming at me, he just agreed. I mean, not right away, but he got there eventually, and then we were both friends, and it was the most surreal experience of my entire life.

And then we were _best_ friends, which was even _more_ surreal, and, even though I broke the object in Craig’s life that he valued the most, he told me he didn’t care, and that he wasn’t mad, and he took me to return that sacred object when I tried to replace it, and it was probably the strangest afternoon of my entire life, but it was okay in the end, so I took the strange as something good.

And then a week later, Craig and I had matching, nasty, purple bruises, because he actually cared enough about me to beat up four guys -- probably the toughest guys at the entire college, besides, apparently Craig -- _at the same time_ , and then after that, he got worried about me whenever something even _slightly_ bad happened, and it was _way_ too much pressure, because every time he asked me if I was okay, or something else that was super embarrassing, I would blush, which was humiliating enough so that I blushed _more_ , and I didn’t know if he noticed or not, but if he did, he didn’t draw any attention to it, which I really appreciated a lot.

And then after that, I told him. About _me_ , and . . . you know. About that _thing_. About me not liking girls as much as people like Clyde did. And you know what he said?

 _You’re my best friend. And if they do disown you, then I’ll kidnap you and take you everywhere with me, and then neither of us would be alone_.

And you know what he called me after that?

His platonic soul mate.

I mean, Craig was the first person to _ever_ know about me, and that was his fucking reaction? Not even my _parents_ knew. Not even my _Uncle Bryan_ knew when he was still alive, and, besides Craig, my Uncle Bryan was the one other person I was really, super close to. I’m _pretty_ sure that my Uncle Bryan knew, though, because he would always ask about my classmates, and especially some of the boys, and he would see if I made any friends at school, but of course I never did.

I was _sure_ that Craig would just laugh in my face, call me a disgusting ‘f’ word, and walk out of my life forever. But Craig Tucker pulled the carpet out from under me _again_ when he told me all those things about wanting to kidnap me, and being my best friend forever, and then he . . . hugged me. He _willingly_ hugged me. That had never happened before, and, in the time that Craig had his warm arms tucked around my body, my heart -- which was usually heavy with worry and anxiety -- felt lighter than I knew was even possible. I fell asleep in two minutes, which is about 2000% faster than normal, and the last thing I felt before I was officially under, was Craig’s hand dragging circles on my back.

I woke up that next morning under my blankets.

And then after that, we spent an entire afternoon together, just dicking around in our dorm room, sometimes watching Red Racer, sometimes playing card games, sometimes making fun of all of Craig’s old friends from his hometown, and sometimes just talking about dumb shit that was irrelevant to everything else that was going on around us, but that last part didn’t matter, because it was fun, and it took my mind off of the fact that someone knew that I favored other guys more than girls, even though that person accepted me.

But then, everything changed, again. I made a lot of other friends. Well, I made friends with Kenny and Butters, but that was pretty good for me, so I called it a lot, even though it pretty much wasn’t. And it was even more surreal than just having one single best friend. It was . . . good.

But, even though that was good for _me_ , there was a shift in my friendship with Craig.  He started getting . . . weird. Every time I would leave to hang out with Kenny or Butters or something, but mostly Kenny, _specifically_ Kenny, he would get all quiet and and irritated, but I could never figure out why.

And then something else happened. Craig and I went out to lunch together after class one day, and you wouldn’t even believe it, it felt so much like a real date, and it was _so much fun_ , and I soaked up the feeling of seeing him sitting across from me at a restaurant table, smiling and rolling his eyes and laughing, and it was the closest I was probably going to get to any romantic . . . _anything_ with Craig at all. But, it wasn’t all good, because our waiter . . .

Jesus Christ.

His name was Nikiel, and he was hot. Really, _really_ hot. He had a chiseled chin, and a charming smile, and warm brown eyes, and if Craig didn’t exist, maybe I would’ve liked him, but that part didn’t really matter, because you know who Nikiel had eyes for?

Craig.

And do you know what Nikiel said to Craig?

 _You should stop by again and try the dark meat. It’s even better_.

But Jesus Christ, you think _that’s_ bad? You know what _else_ he said?

_I think you’re hot._

_You’ve got nice eyes._

_If you’re interested . . . call me sometime_.

I mean, who the fuck did he think he was? Even though Craig and I weren’t dating, and Craig was clearly faking being my best friend, he should’ve fucking known not to flirt with a guy like that, because . . .

. . . Well, fuck, I don’t actually know why, but Jesus Christ, he pissed me the fuck off, and I had to actually press my arms to my sides so I wouldn’t punch him in his hot face.

But I could’ve forgotten all of that, because it could’ve just been one-sided, and that wouldn’t have bothered me so much, but you know what happened after that? Craig actually _kept_ Nikiel’s fucking number! And Craig wasn’t even gay! I mean, I didn’t _think_ he was, I was _pretty sure_ he wasn’t, but sometimes I wondered if maybe he wasn’t so sure himself, but I never questioned him, because _I_ hated being questioned about that, and I didn’t want to put him through that.

So I went to hang out with Kenny after that, because I needed a distraction, because, even though most of lunch was fine, almost all of my day was horrible, because I had a fucking heart attack that morning when I woke up and Craig wasn’t there, because I’d had an extremely arousing dream about him and I had been known to talk in my sleep in the past, and I thought he found out, but then he didn’t, and then some other guy started hitting on _my_ Craig, and it was just _way_ too much pressure, _Jesus Christ_ \--

But Kenny just so happened to still be at work, an hour after he said he was supposed to leave, so I counted the _one_ blessing I apparently had, and I hurried over to him, grabbed him by his shirt and hissed into his face,

“Shit happened, and I want to get away from Craig, so I don’t care if you’re free or not, _hang out with me_.” He looked surprised, but there was a soft smirk on his face, too, almost like he was expecting it. “I had a long day, _I_ need to rant, _you_ need to listen, and . . . and we need to, _now_!”

As soon as those words left my mouth, Craig’s voice came from behind me, confused, “Everything okay?”

I whirled around to face him, taking in his suspicious, narrow-eyed look wildly, before averting my gaze to somewhere else -- _anywhere_ else. “Great!” I said, maybe a few beats too late. “Just . . . Kenny and I are . . . It’s, uh -- GAH! -- Well, come on, Kenny, let’s go do that . . .” I swallowed, looking all around me for some inspiration for a  believable-enough lie, but all I could see were loitering college students, and that was pretty much fucking it, so I just stuttered out, “That thing that -- that we were going to do!”

Kenny made this weird snort sound, but I ignored it, instead grabbing onto his arm and pulling him away before Craig had a chance to even think of a response to my complete bullshit answer, but, before I could make my exit completely, Kenny called out, “Okay, ‘bye, Craig, I guess Tweek and I are going to do that thing we were going to do!”

I growled in my head, but I was too focused on getting the fuck _out_ of there that I decided not to validate Kenny’s dumb fucking remark by answering him. I just kept my attention as forward as I could; if Craig was surprised -- which he probably was, everything happened so fucking quickly -- then I didn’t wait around to see it.

As we were hurrying away, Kenny asked, his voice laced with laughter, “Uh, Tweek? What’s going on?”

“GAH! NGH! Weird day,” I said, my voice embarrassingly high-pitched, and I hoped he wouldn’t question me, but of course he fucking did, because he’s Kenny, and he loves being in other people’s business.

“Okay, you want to explain that a little bit?”

I shook my head rapidly, finally slowing down now that I knew Craig couldn’t see us. “EHH! Not really . . .”

“Well, dude, you just said some shit went down and you don’t want to talk to Craig?” Kenny asked, and, when I glanced at him, he had a curious, don’t-bullshit-me smile on his face. “You . . . _know_ I’m not going to just let that pass, right?”

I let out a rough sigh, flinging his hand away from me irritably. “Ugh, fine. Just . . . it’s fucking terrible, okay?!” I guess I shouted that too loudly, because I got a lot of weird head-turns, so, before Kenny could say anything, I added, “GAH! You wanna get coffee?”

Kenny laughed, and he ruffled my hair, _knowing_ that I was just going to bat his hand away. “Tweek, I just clocked out of work at a coffee shop. You really wanna go back?”

“Jesus Christ, no way!” I said, shaking my head again. “Let’s go somewhere else. I just -- I need coffee!”

Kenny was silent for a few seconds, and I could feel his eyes on the side of my face, before he said, “Dude, whatever happened _must’ve_ been terrible; you’re kind of freaking out more than normal.”

I let out a breath, and gripped the front of my coat tightly. “Let’s get coffee first,” I said, twitching my head to the side irritably. “I’ll tell you then.”

So Kenny and I walked to the nearest coffee house, which was just around the corner, and was a tiny place that only had like four or five tables, and Kenny found us one pressed up against the far wall while I got in line to order. Well, there wasn’t a line at all, but I stood in front of the counter and tried not to get scared by the scary-looking old lady who was staring at me.

“Uh . . . coffee,” I mumbled, tugging at the front of my coat. “Black, please. Large.”

She hummed irritably, typing some numbers into this old-looking keypad on the table. “Anything else?” she asked, her voice deep, like a man.

“GAH! NGH! No thank you, uh . . . ma’am . . .” My attempts at being polite went completely unnoticed by her, and she pressed another button and said,

“Okay, that’ll be $2.39.”

I nodded, pulling my wallet out of my pocket with shaking fingers, and I flipped it open, ruffling through the crumpled one dollar bills, before pulling three out and handing them over to her. She swiped them out of my hand faster than I expected, and I withdrew my arm like her skin was made of poison, and she opened the register, grunting as she flipped up the handles, and shifted around some coins, and then she closed it again, handing me some cold change, and saying, “Sixty-one cents. Shouldn’t take me long. Wait here.”

And that was the most ominous thing any barista had ever told me, so I shoved the change into my pocket, where I put my wallet, and I stayed locked in place, and waited as I watched with wide eyes as she poured this steaming black liquid into a larger-than-I-expected cup, and she popped a lid on top, wrapped a cardboard thing around it so that the paper wouldn’t burn me, and then she came back.

“Here.”

I took it from her, trying not to shake too much, and said, “Thank you,” but she didn’t reply, not like I really expected her to.

I made my way to Kenny, who was texting someone on his phone -- probably Butters -- and he looked up when he saw me coming. “Hey. You ready?”

I put my coffee down on the table, pulled my coat off, hung it off the back of the wooden chair, and I sat down, nodding. My coffee was hotter than I expected; I normally didn’t really care how hot a coffee was, but this one was pretty much actually boiling, so I figured I’d wait a few seconds before I started drinking. “Yeah . . . it’s kind of embarrassing, though . . .”

He smirked. “I wouldn’t expect anything less. So, tell me why you don’t want to be around Craig right now, and want to hang with me, lowly Kenny, of all people.”

I took a long, deep breath, and plunged right into it.

Even though it took forever, and I’m pretty sure half of it wasn’t even coherent, I finally managed to get the story out completely, from the start of our lunch, to the introduction of that jackass waiter, to the one-sided exchange of phone numbers, and I wasn’t exactly sure what I expected Kenny’s reaction to be, but I was surprised when he just shrugged and said,

“So why are you upset? Craig’s not gay. And you only like him as a best friend.” He smirked, his eyes lighting up  just a tiny bit more. “Right?

I shook my head rapidly and said, “GAH! Yeah, just . . . he’s just a friend, it’s just I was, uh . . . worried that . . . he might get . . . that something might . . . happen --”

“Like what?”

“Like -- NGH! EHH! -- I don’t know, something bad!”

I got a dirty look from the one other person that was sitting down for coffee, but I ignored them, turning my gaze to my black coffee that was actually better than I was expecting it to be.

There as a beat of silence after my accidental explosion, before Kenny said, his voice all quiet, “Tweek, is there something you want to tell me?”

I wrapped my fingers around the cup protectively, taking a long, long, long gulp. I hesitated, before shaking my head. “NGH! Not . . . not right now . . .”

 _At some point . . . when it gets to be too painful to keep inside . ._.

When Kenny fell silent again, I glanced up, but he didn’t look angry or irritated or annoyed with me for not telling him anything, he had a small smile on his face, and he said, “Okay. Not right now.”

I nodded, feeling incredibly thankful that Kenny hadn’t pressed the issue, because I didn’t think I could’ve handled having to tell Kenny all about wanting hop in Craig’s bed and doing less-than-platonic things with him without warning, and in a pubic enough place. And I was even more thankful when Kenny added,

“So, other than a sexy waiter hitting on your . . . _best friend_ , how was your day?”

And, even though he mentioned Nikiel again, I decided to relax and ignore that part, and the spontaneous coffee outing with Kenny turned out to not actually be too bad.

* * *

Craig wasn’t as angry as I thought he was going to be when I got back to my dorm room later that day. He was a little awkward, and a little quiet, but, after we ate dinner and studied, he was quickly back to his normal self, rolling his eyes and making fun of me and not getting mad whenever I yelled at him when we were playing war and I lost, and it was so much fun, and it was almost like all the shitty feelings I’d been feeling about him not being gay and not liking me back kind of went away, because we were still _Tweek and Craig_.

And really, that was all I ever wanted.

* * *

Sometimes I felt like I loved Craig too much.

So much it made my chest hurt sometimes, and I never really dealt with . . . heart pain like that well. But it was even worse, because, before all the fucking bullshit happened, I knew he could _never_ find out about it, because, if he did, he’d be _disgusted_ , and he’d shout at me, or even fucking worse, he’d do that passive-aggressive shit, and, of course after that, we’d never be friends again, and he’d leave me forever, and I’d be heartbroken, and I’d become a recluse that hated the world -- more than I already did -- and I’d die in an old people’s home because I was all alone in life and nobody would’ve wanted to take care of me besides trained professionals who were paid to.

But my feelings for Craig, like all my feelings that I’d ever felt, were too strong for me to keep inside, but I just _couldn’t_ tell Craig. As private as I was when it came to the important shit, I was used to being able to just shout things and not get shit for it, because that was just . . . what I did, and people accepted it, and I never felt the need to stop, because I actually couldn’t _physically_ stop, because if I didn’t shout random shit all the time, my brain would probably explode and then the police would have to scrape my bloody cerebrum off of my walls and floor and I didn’t want anyone to actually _see_ my crazy brain, because it was bad enough they were forced to hear it all when everything got too much.

And I kept it in for much longer than I expected myself to, and, had I waited just three more weeks, I could’ve exploded at home, when my parents were at work, and I’d be perfectly fine by the time I got back for the second semester. But the longer I spent looking at Craig, being around him, and just . . . breathing his air, I realized that I wasn’t going to be able to hold it inside for that long. I had to tell _someone_ , _anyone_ , and there was only one person that I’d trust with something like that.

Yes, Kenny.

When you first think about it, it sounds like a weird choice, but there was something that I found very trustworthy in how Kenny talked about me and Craig. I mean, he made fun of us all the time, but there was something about the _way_ he made fun of us that made me think he’d be understanding if I told him, so I did, and I remember that conversation in great detail, because it was one of the most anxious conversations that I’d ever had with anybody ever.

It’s not like I had planned on a time and place to tell him. Organization is _way_ too much pressure, and I was too worried about being around other people to just _leave_ for Kenny’s apartment without Craig right next to me, (whenever I would hang out with Kenny, Kenny would always wait just outside my dorm building, so I never had to walk anywhere alone), but if Craig was right next to me, then that would defeat the whole purpose of keeping my biggest secret from the object of my biggest secret. But Kenny had the habit of just appearing out of nowhere, so I figured I wouldn’t really actually have to wait too long, or have to go to him, and that ended up working out just like I’d kind of hoped it would, because the day after the shitstorm with Nikiel, Kenny probably _sensed_ that I needed to explode at someone, and he showed up while Craig was off at environmental science.

It was just me all alone in our dorm room for a couple hours, and I spent the majority of that time alternating between flipping through my many, many drawings of Craig, and steadily working on a few cool-looking building designs that would not be able to stand without collapsing but looked cool anyway, (I had gotten a lot more creative since I’d met Craig), before Kenny knocked on the door.

I jumped out of my skin, and hurriedly put my notebook under my pillow, before hopping to my feet and hurrying to the door. I didn’t actually know it was going to be Kenny; he didn’t text me or anything so I mustered up as much courage as I could and called, in as deep a voice as I was capable of,

“GAH! Who is it?”

Kenny snorted. “It’s Kenny, dumbass, open the door.”

I grinned, and immediately flung the door open, letting him in. He waved, pushing past me in the room, and making himself comfortable on my bed just as I was closing the door behind me. I turned around to face him, and, when I caught his eye, he smirked, and said, “Where’s lover boy?”

I blushed, ducking my head so that he couldn’t see. “GAH! NGH! Craig’s got environmental science right now.”

“And you . . . ?”

“NGH! I have Tuesdays off.”

Kenny nodded. “I see. Well, I was just wondering if you and Craig wanted to --”

“Kenny . . . GAH! Can I . . . talk to you? For just a second?” I completely interrupted him, crossing the room and sitting on the edge of my bed nervously, but I just _needed_ to get those fucking words off of my chest, it was going to drive me insane if I kept them in for any longer, and I already had been for _months_. It was eating me from the inside like there were maggots in my chest, consuming my heart and lungs and . . . the other organs that are in the chest area.

Kenny eyed me carefully, curiously, and nodded. “Sure. What’s up? Everything okay?”

I contemplated how to answer. Theoretically, everything was just fine. I had a best friend, and other friends I could confide in, I was doing well in school, and I hadn’t gotten a _single_ phone call from my parents since the beginning of October. All they did was tell me about strings of murders that happened in my area, or a rapist that had just escaped prison that was looking for someone who resembled me, or if there was a newly-discovered venereal disease that my parents told me I could get from kissing a ginger, anyway, and they would never ask how I was doing. I didn’t miss their passive aggressive voice mails, or their annoying honey voices. I was happy.

But it didn’t really matter that I was happy, because I was still in love with my best friend, and I couldn’t act on it, and, even though nobody could tell,  it was really taking a toll on me.

I sighed, and shook my head slowly. “Uh . . . not really.” I hesitated, glancing at Kenny out of the corner of my eye, but he was just patiently watching me, his eyes full of understanding, with a small, concerned smile on his face. _He’s a really great guy. Butters is one of the luckiest guys in the world_ , I remember thinking fondly. “I . . . well, I can’t really . . . I can’t go to Craig with any of this . . .”

Kenny’s smile grew a bit wider. “Let me guess. You like Craig a little more than you think you should, right?”

I jolted in surprise, staring at him with wide eyes. “GAH! _What_?! Can you read _minds_? Oh, God, oh, _Jesus_ , how the fuck did you know that I --”

Kenny shook his head, laughing quietly. “Anybody who’s got _eyes_ can see it. You and Craig are so gay for each other, it’s not even funny anymore. I mean, I still make jokes about it, but even _I_ think it’s starting to get old.”

I scowled at him. “Shut up, Kenny! This is serious! I’m in love with my best friend, and he can’t ever find out!”

The amusement fell from Kenny’s face and he raised an eyebrow at me. “What do you mean, he can’t ever find out? I’m pretty sure he’d be stoked to hear you say that you’re hopelessly in love with him.”

“No he wouldn’t!” I insisted, my hands balling into fists on my lap. I was so _sick_ of people telling me Craig liked me more than a friend, because it was such a blatant lie, that (Kenny was right) it wasn’t even funny anymore. Well, it wasn’t ever funny, but it just increasingly less funny the more people teased me about it. “GAH! I’ve never loved anyone before! Love is the worst thing ever invented! One person could break me into a million pieces by saying _one_ word, and that’s just the worst thing of all time!” I jumped to my feet in my passion. I was yelling, but I sort of felt like it was justified, and everything just came flooding out of my mouth. “Craig is the greatest person I’ve ever met in my entire life! He’s the only other person our age who watches Red Racer as much as I do, and he’s patient whenever I have freak outs, and he walks me to classes ever since I got beat up, and he’s the hottest guy in existence!” Okay, that last part was something that I’d rather have kept to myself, but it was out, and I was so far into my confession that words just kept coming and coming, without my permission, and with no end in sight. “Have you _seen_ his chest? His arms? I accidentally peeked when he was getting changed one morning, and he’s got the biggest dick I’ve ever seen in my entire life! That thing could _destroy_ me, but, even if we did ever do that ever, he would be . . . _gentle_ , because that’s just who he is around me! You know he actually held me when I told him I was gay? I was going out of my mind, my brain was vibrating and my eyes couldn’t hold still, because I didn’t know if he’d leave me if he found out, but instead of going psycho on me for liking other guys, he just told me he didn’t care and that he would kidnap me if I was ever disowned, and he hugged me until I fell asleep, and then he put me to bed! Craig _Tucker_ did that, Kenny! For _me_! How . . .” I let out a very, _very_ deep breath, (which was apparently so deep that pretty much my entire body deflated), and said, in a calmer voice, “How can I _not_ love him?”

Kenny sighed, but it wasn’t angry, it wasn’t disappointed, and it wasn’t bored, it was more contemplative and thoughtful than the irritated sigh that my mind had conjured up from him as a response. “You’re right. Craig would never do that for anybody else.”

“He almost caught me, you know,” I said quickly, sitting back down and pulling at my hair. “I was having a . . . a-a _dream_ about him, and, when I woke up, the room was empty, and I thought I talked in my sleep, and that he’d heard me and ran away, and I thought he was never going to _talk_ to me again, and it was _so fucking scary_ \--”

Kenny put his hand on my shoulder, gripping me tightly and reassuringly. It almost felt like Craig. “Tweek, I may not be entirely in touch with reality, but, right now, I know three things for sure: 1), I’m going to marry Butters after we graduate, 2), Ann Coulter is secretly a demon-worshipping lizard, and 3), you and Craig are soul mates and are going to get married and have cute coffee-addicted asshole children.”

I made one of my annoying twitchy noises, and gripped the front of my shirt tightly. One of those days, the buttons were just going to pop right off. “But I . . . GAH! _I don’t have a uterus_!” I exclaimed, tugging harshly and praying in the back of my mind for my shirt to hold.

Kenny laughed, patting my shoulder a few times before letting me go. “I didn’t mean that --”

“Craig doesn’t have one, either!” I continued, staring ahead of me at nothing as I tried to wrap my head around the situation I had found myself in. At that point I was only absentmindedly talking, which was how I talked normally, anyway. “And I don’t want to do him like _that_!”

“Don’t want to do him like . . .” Kenny said slowly, before he paused and chuckled. “Aww, Tweek, you’re the cutest bottom ever!”

“GAH! Don’t say it like _that_!” I said, glaring at him through narrowed eyes. “Besides, nothing’s going to happen, anyway, because he can’t ever find out!”

Kenny looked at me for a few seconds before he patted my shoulder again. “Okay, Tweek. I’m going to tell you a few stories about Craig, and I don’t want you to take them the wrong way. He was a kid. An _asshole_ kid, but still. Do you want to hear about little fourth-grader Craig?”

I nodded, intrigued.

“When Craig was a kid, he was surprisingly impressionable. You wouldn’t think so, because now he really doesn’t care about _hardly_ anything, but when we were younger, it honestly didn’t take much to convince him of something. He was one of Cartman’s biggest weapons, because he constantly believed what that fatass said. He’ll never admit it, but almost every single of one Cartman’s more mild schemes almost always managed to suck Craig in, whether he consciously wanted them to, or not. When Cartman first spread hate against gingers, Craig was one of the biggest perpetrators in the school. He came up with the idea to ban gingers from the cafeteria, because Cartman made an entire presentation about how gingers were inferior to everyone else.”

That . . . surprised me. It shouldn't have, but it did.

“And I know he already told you about this one, because it pissed him off so much that he brought it up for years after it happened, and he jumps at the chance to bitch about it. I don’t think he ever really forgave us for it.” Kenny smirked. “The whole Peruvian pan flute band thing? When we got detained by the government and shipped off to Peru, and Craig realized he’s king of the guinea pigs?” He chuckled. “He burned a whole in your jeans, I can’t believe I almost forgot that. Well, anyway, we learned on that trip that Craig actually literally hated us. Something about never learning from our mistakes, and reeling him into an exciting scheme he didn’t want to be a part of?” Kenny smiled thoughtfully. “It was probably that last part that pissed him off the most. He hates excitement, and that was just an entire week of nothing _but_ excitement. Oh, man, he was _so pissed_ at us. We never paid him back, either.”

Even though I’d heard that story in it’s entirety before, and I was even _burned_ by Craig’s laser eyes, it apparently still hadn’t really set in with me. “That’s fucking wild, man.”

Kenny waved me off. “A lot of weird shit happens to kids in South Park. I’m sure nothing like that’s ever happened to you before.”

I shook my head. “No! King of the guinea pigs is _way_ more fucked up than the Underpants Gnomes, and I thought that was the most fucked up thing to ever happen to anyone!”

Kenny looked at me oddly. “Um . . . Underpants Gnomes?”

I nodded hurriedly. “Yeah! They come at 3:30 am, every night, and steal your underpants! I have spent a _fortune_ on underwear, man! They haven’t found me yet here, thank _Jesus_ ; I’d have to buy new boxers every week if they had!”

There was an awkward silence, where Kenny just stared at me. Finally, he said, “Any other weird things happen to you when you were a kid?”

I thought back. Really, I had just assumed I had a normal childhood, but, besides the Underpants Gnomes, there were only two other things that stood out. One of those two things I would never tell anybody, even if they had a gun to my head, but the other one was so weird that I never thought people would believe me, so I hadn’t ever told anyone. Not even my parents, but I figured, if Craig being king of the guinea pigs and having laser eyes was normal enough for Kenny, then my one other thing would probably seem like nothing.

“Yeah. I was kidnapped by Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt when I was in fourth grade.”

There was a beat of silence. “You were . . . kidnapped? By Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt?”

I nodded. “Yeah. It turns out, it was her time of the month, and she freaked out and wanted to adopt another kid, and I just happened to be walking home from school, and she had Brad Pitt stuff me in their back seat with all her other kids. That’s actually when I learned how to shoot a bazooka.”

Kenny stared at me. “You can shoot a bazooka? You’ve _shot_ a _bazooka_ before?”

I nodded again. “Apparently Angelina Jolie has a long-lost brother that nobody knew about, and he was convinced that I was being kept as a slave, so he tried to liberate me, or whatever, but it turns out he was actually trying to sell me as an underground sex slave, and, in order to escape, I had to kill him. And the only weapon around was a bazooka.”

“You’ve fucking _killed_ someone before?” Kenny asked, his voice so full of shock that it took me by surprise.

And it _should’ve_ taken him by surprise, because I didn’t realize how fucked up it was that I’d committed _murder_ when I was nine. It was just sort of something that had happened to me when I was a kid. I wasn’t particularly fazed by it.

Jesus Christ, I was a messed up kid. In more than a few ways.

I nodded again, slower. “Yeah . . . but it was self-defense, I swear! If I didn’t, I would be ass deep in dicks right now.”

Kenny snorted. “Nice pun. Bad taste.”

I rolled my eyes. “Is that weird enough for you?”

He nodded and said, “Craig was damn right, Tweek. You would’ve fit right in in South Park.”

I couldn’t tell if that was a good thing or a bad thing. “GAH! What do you mean? Is that bad?”

Kenny smirked and shook his head. “Hell, no. I personally love being a South Park kid. Weird shit just happens to you all the fucking time. Sometimes it sucks donkey balls.” He paused, and then added, “Most of the time, it _totally_ sucks donkey balls, especially if you’re me, but I owe a lot to South Park. And if you’re being stalked by these . . . _underpants gnomes_ , then it sounds like you’ll be just perfect there. I mean, Craig hated being a South Park kid, but he was one of the biggest ones out of all of us, even if he didn’t want to be. I mean . . .” Kenny snorted. “He can shoot fucking _lasers_ from his fucking _eyes_. But he misses South Park, even if he won’t admit it. If he didn’t, he wouldn’t hang out with us, and, besides you, we’re the only people he _does_ hang out with. Once a South Park kid, always a South Park kid. We’re happy to welcome recruits, if you’re interested.”

I had no idea what to say to that, so I just screeched loudly, and stared at the floor.

Kenny broke the silence. “So, all this time you’ve been hanging out with me, you were just working up the courage to tell me this?”

I nodded. “GAH! Yeah. It’s . . . this isn’t something I find easy to tell someone, but I was about to burst.”

Kenny chuckled. “Yeah, I could tell.”

“Just . . . GAH! -- Remember, Craig can’t know about this,” I said, and I inwardly cringed at how shaky my voice was. I had tried so hard to sound assertive, even threatening if I could manage it, but it just sounded nervous and weak, and I hated my voice. There was a doubtful look on Kenny’s face, so I added, “I’m serious, Kenny.”

Kenny rolled his eyes. “Yeah, yeah. I don’t see why you can’t just tell him. I mean, he’s your best friend.”

“Exactly,” I said. “He’s my best friend. That _doesn’t_ mean I can tell him this. That’s the exact reason why I _can’t_ tell him about this. I’m lucky Craig didn’t _hate_ me for being gay, but wanting to be _fucked_ by a guy, and being in _love_ with a guy are two totally different things!”

Kenny just stared at me, his eyes narrowed and suspicious, and, when I realized he clearly didn’t plan on answering me at all, I only hesitated a moment before adding, quietly, “Please don’t tell him.”

Kenny let out this irritated breath. “Fine. I won’t tell him. But if you keep this from him, it’s only going to get worse, for you _and_ him. And probably me, too. You said he’s already getting suspicious, right?”

I sighed. He had a point. Craig had been acting really weird. “GAH! -- Yeah . . . whenever I can’t hang out, because you and I are getting together instead, he gets really . . . weird. Moody.”

Kenny shot me one of those you’re-an-idiot looks. “. . . You _know_ that that’s just because he --”

I screeched loudly as a way to interrupt him, and tugged on my hair. “GAH! Don’t even say it out loud! I know it’s not true, so just . . .” I sighed angrily. “Don’t say it out loud.”

Kenny shook his head. “Dude, Tweek, you are _so_ in denial --”

“ _Kenny_ \--”

“Alright, alright, fine,” Kenny said, raising his arms in surrender. “I won’t bring it up again, I swear. I still think you should tell him, but it’s up to you.”

I nodded, letting out a small breath, and plopped down on my bed, pulling my knees into my chest.

There was a long beat of silence, before Kenny said, “Look,” Kenny said, after a few seconds of silence, “I’ve gotta meet Token and Clyde in a few minutes; none of us have classes on Tuesday, so we were going to go out for lunch, but I’m guessing you’re not really in the mood to go out?”

I shook my head, but didn’t say anything.

He sighed softly. “Are you going to be okay here on your own?”

I nodded, but didn’t say anything.

“Okay,” he agreed, patting me on the shoulder, before making his way over to my dorm room door. “I’ll see you later, okay? Text me if you need me.”

“GAH! Okay. Thanks, Kenny.”

He nodded, with another smile, and, with a final glance, Kenny opened up the door and left.

Craig didn’t come back until really late that night. He scared the fucking hell out of me; I was expecting him to be back by 1:00, at the _very latest_ , and he didn’t even text me to say where he was! I thought for sure he was kidnapped, and I must’ve texted him four hundred times asking him where he was!

And I was so happy to see him when he came back, because I had missed him, and I was looking forward to playing a hand of cards or something, but he . . . wasn’t really in the mood to hang out. Every time I asked if he wanted to do something, he shut me down, in that . . . that _voice_ he used when I first met him. I was going out of my fucking mind, because I had never seen Craig that upset before, and I mean, it wasn’t like he was crying, or being . . . mean, or anything like that, but he was just . . . cold, like he really actually didn’t care. Like when I first met him.

I figured he must’ve had a really, _really_ bad day, but he didn’t really say anything when I asked, just that he wasn’t in the mood and wanted to go to sleep. I kind of understood that, because I’d had plenty of days where I felt like that, and I knew he wouldn’t have wanted me to pester him, so I just told him to feel better in as few words as my racing mind could, but all he did was grunt, and change into his pajamas, and then face the wall, and then ignore me completely. I was _really_ worried about him, but he had told me he was fine, and I always wanted him to believe me when I told him that, so I decided to trust him.

...

Who am I fucking kidding, I didn’t trust a single fucking word that left his mouth, because the next morning, he didn’t even say anything when he woke me up. Even when he was irritated with me from some small little argument we had had before we went to sleep, he would still shake me awake, tell me what time it was, (with usually a “get your lazy ass up”, or “rise and shine, you fucking asshole” sprinkled in there somewhere), and then just comment on something every once in awhile as we got dressed and as he walked me to my class. But he didn’t do _any_ of that, he threw a fucking pillow at my face and just shrugged and said, “Sorry,” when I yelled at him for it.

And he hardly even talked to me at all when he walked me to my class, no matter how hard I tried to get him to. He would either just make this grunting sound, or he’d just say, “Yes”, “No,” “I don’t know,” or “I don’t care.” And that was all he said, for the entire ten minutes it took for us to get to my building.

And he just grumbled a quick,

“Seeya after class,”

before he just walked away without waiting for an answer, or to see if I even heard him or not.

I walked into class like a zombie, and, without thinking, before my professor showed up, I pulled my phone out of my pocket and sent Kenny a quick text to ask him if we could hang out after class. I didn’t really think about Craig’s part in the equation, mostly because Craig was the entire reason I was making plans with Kenny anyway, which I realized afterwards was a total shithead move, but I was just so worried, and I didn’t know how to fix him, and Kenny always knew what to say, so I was sure he’d be able to help me.

I got a text back from Kenny that said,

_sure, and hey, i found some videos of craig from south park, you wanna watch em later_

And I perked up just a little at that. Because I really, really did, and I forced myself to focus on that, instead of the overwhelming concern that I had just been feeling.

And Craig was late picking me up, too. A whole five minutes late, and, ever since the whole thing with me getting the shit kicked out of me, Craig always made it a point to get there early, or as on-time as he could, because, even though Craig knew that the entire school was terrified of how strong he was, he was still so goddamn worried all the time.

So, when he did come to pick me up, he was still weirdly quiet, and wouldn’t really look at me, and it made that worry that dulled throughout class come back again. And I had gotten so _happy_ when I first saw him, walking towards my building, because I was worried that he wouldn’t show up, but when I smiled at him, (and I should note here that he always smiled back at me when I smiled at him), he was barely looking at me, and he still had that dull, grey expression on his face, and his voice somehow seemed even . . . flatter when he answered my question of ‘if his teacher had held him back,’

“No. Lost track of time. Ready?”

And then came the moment of fucking truth. I _hated_ telling Craig whenever I was going to hang out with Kenny, because for a split second, his face would fall and, even though he’d try to hide it, he would get noticeably disappointed, and I actually kind of hoped for that reaction, because that would mean that he actually still cared about me, which I was starting to worry was no longer the case, so I bit the bullet hard, and said, trying to make it as painless and simple and diplomatic as possible, “I’m going to hang out with Kenny.”

I had somewhat gotten the reaction I wanted, but there was something special about that Wednesday, because his entire posture just slouched and his face twitched. He tried even harder than normal to seem unaffected by this, and he shifted, lifting his eyes to stare at the clouds.

It was this expression that made me want to cancel plans with Kenny, which probably wouldn’t have been that big of a deal, considering it was Kenny, and we had made the plans only two hours earlier, but I had learned my lesson about canceling at the last minute. And Kenny and I were going to do a little “Part 2” from my screamed confession from the day before, so it wasn’t like I was going to just _ditch_ Kenny. I mean, I was worried as fuck about Craig, and I was _going_ to talk about him nonstop to Kenny, to the point where Kenny was probably just going to kick me out of his apartment and tell me to go _make out with my boyfriend and calm down_.

And I really really hoped Craig would tell me not to go, because one word would’ve convinced me in a heartbeat that hurting Kenny’s feelings by ditching him for my best friend who was clearly absolutely miserable would be totally worth it. Because it would mean he wanted me around, and if he wanted me around, then I was going to be there.

But all he said was, “Okay.”

I opened my mouth to say something, but Kenny -- for the first time in his life -- had the worst timing ever, and shouted, “Tweek! Over here! Let’s go!”

I let out a long breath, squeezing my eyes shut to try to make the conflicting pain go away. I didn’t even know what was wrong, it was an _extremely_ frustrating situation, to be in pain and not know why. And, just before I left, my heart tugged me back to Craig, and I said,

“Are you sure you’re okay?”

 _Look at me,_ please _just look at me, tell me you’re okay, and fucking mean it ._. .

Craig cleared his throat, but kept his eyes at the sky, his knuckles white around the straps of his bookbag. “Fine.”

 _Bullshit_.

“You’re not fine, Craig. Don’t lie to me, did something happen yesterday?”

Craig shook his head and said, his voice blank, but with a slight edge that hadn’t been there earlier, “Nope. If something happened, I probably would’ve told you.” And then, for the first time all morning, he stared at me head-on, his electric-blue eyes piercing me to my very core, and my heart skipped a beat; it was more intense than any look he’d ever given me, and I didn’t know what to do. But then he said, clearly bitterly irritated, “Like you’d tell me if something happened with _you_ , right?”

The entire conversation with Kenny raced through my mind, and I felt a brief panic shoot through my chest -- accompanied by the sharp pain of guilt that pulled on every vein in my body, but I swallowed it away, and said, “Yeah, you’re right, I would.” I didn’t think I sounded very convincing, but Craig seemed to believe it, I guess; he just cleared his throat and looked at the sky again, that brick-wall expression glued to his face.

“Then there you go,” he said flatly. “You should probably leave. You don’t want to keep Kenny waiting. He’s not known for being patient.”

Another stab. White hot and painful. I hesitated, very seriously considering ditching Kenny to follow Craig back to our dorm room so that I could interrogate him until he told me what the _fuck_ was wrong, but I ultimately decided against it, for several reasons.

  1. I had learned -- very painfully -- that you don’t ever ditch someone you’ve already made plans with, and
  2. My brain was on fire and I didn’t think I’d be able to hide how crazy that entire week had made me, and that would probably just make Craig’s mood worse, and
  3. Craig needed some space, clearly. He didn’t need me buzzing in his ear.



So I muttered under my breath, “I’ll be back later,” and I left.

The trip across the street was pure agony, because I had a sick feeling in my gut that going with Kenny instead of following Craig was the wrong decision, but I tried to push it out of my mind and focus on what Kenny promised.

I would get to see South Park Craig. I would get to hear more stories about Craig as a child. I would get the opportunity to talk someone’s ear off about how worried I was, and about how much my chest hurt, and about how much I wanted to kiss Craig’s lips off without him finding out that I was in love with him.

And Kenny knew something was wrong as soon as I stopped in front of him, because all I did was mumble a quick, “Hey,” to him, before I returned my attention to where Craig had stood before, to see if he was looking at me, or if he was even still there at all, but he was gone. I couldn’t even see his hat moving through the thin crowd of students who had loitered after class.

I guess I was quiet for too long, because Kenny nudged me, and said, “Uh, Tweek? Everything okay? You look . . . horrible.”

I frowned, looking up at him with narrowed eyebrows. “GAH! Today was really shitty,” I ground out irritably.

Kenny looked me up and down, offering me a calm, reassuring smile, and said, “Well, we’ll see if I can make you feel better. You ready to go?”

I chewed on my bottom lip, nodding absently, but not answering other than that.

Kenny’s apartment wasn’t too far from where we were, only about a ten minute walk, but it was painfully uncomfortable, because Kenny was just going on and on about something, I wasn’t even listening, and I just walked next to him, staring at the ground with my hands in my pockets and my heart left behind with Craig, who had probably already gotten to our dorm room by then. If Kenny noticed that my consciousness wasn’t even there, he didn’t say anything, he just kept rambling, and I guess that was fine with me, because his voice had sort of dulled into white noise after awhile.

I didn’t even realize when we showed up at Kenny’s apartment. I only figured it out when I noticed I had stopped walking, and Kenny was nudging me with his shoulder. “Tweek? We’re here.” So he definitely knew that I wasn’t paying attention, but he didn’t seem angry about it, so I figured he was okay with it.

“GAH! NGH! Okay,” I mumbled, adjusting my textbooks in my arms.

Kenny and Stan’s apartment was on the second floor of the apartment building. Kenny opened the door for me, and I trudged up the stairs, clutching my textbooks to my chest and watching my feet to make sure I didn’t trip, because a broken leg was not what I needed that day.

By the time we got to the apartment -- #212 -- Kenny unlocked it for us, and pushed it open. It was a little on the colder side in there, but I wasn’t too bothered by it. I had the coat Craig gave me, after all. I walked over to the couch -- a ratty old thing, but probably the best Stan and Kenny could afford; though I was impressed by the whole thing, so I was no complaining -- there was a tv on a stand that was just barely a piece of wood on four legs, there was a coffee table in front of the couch that had empty beer cans all over it, and there were three arm chairs that looked to be in the same shape as the couch. It was homey. I liked it.

“Stan’s not here,” Kenny said, hanging his coat up on a hook by the door. “He’s got a date with Wendy. So it’s just us.”

I nodded, moving aside some beer cans so that I could put my textbooks on the coffee table, and I unzipped my coat and hung it next to Kenny’s, and I plopped down on the couch irritably.

Kenny plopped down next to me, folded his arms over his chest, and leveled a calm look at me. “What happened? You’re twitching.”

I ignored that last part, and drew my legs into my chest, locking my hands around my thighs to keep them in place. “I don’t know . . .” I mumbled, my voice shakier than normal. “It’s just -- GAH! -- Craig’s . . . sad. And I don’t know why! He won’t tell me, and I don’t know what to do!”

“Give him a blow job,” Kenny said casually, shrugging when I shot him an incredulous look. “What? That’s what Butters and I do when one of us wants to go on a homicidal rampage, which happens way more than you think it does.”

I shook my head irritably. “I’m being serious,” I mumbled, burying my face in my knees. “He won’t even _look_ at me, man, I don’t know how to make him feel better! And I’m not giving him a . . . a _blow job!_ _Jesus_ , man, that is _way_ too much pressure --”

Kenny laughed, ruffling my hair and smirking when I shot him another glare. “You’re adorable, you know that? I’m sure he’s fine. And if he isn’t, then just give him some time to cool off and get his shit together. Craig can’t handle emotions; if something happened, it’ll take him fucking forever to be able to talk about it.”

I let out a breath, trying to let Kenny’s words comfort me. “He’s always been like that?”

“Always,” Kenny said with a firm nod. “And don’t be afraid to completely betray his trust when he does tell you,” he added, his voice losing that comforting tone and returning to his sarcastic teasing. “I’ve gotta know what’s ruffled Craig Fucker’s feathers, it’s gonna be hilarious --”

I glared at him and shook my head wildly. “No way, man! I may not be able to keep my own secrets, but I take other people’s shit to the grave!”

He rolled his eyes. “I was kidding, Tweek, relax.”

I let out another breath, burying my face in my knees again. “GAH! Sorry. I’m . . . I’m a little on edge.”

“Yeah, I can see that,” Kenny said. “But I think I know what’ll make you feel better.”

I didn’t lift my head, I just mumbled into my jeans, “What?”

“Videos of baby Craig.”

My head jerked up at that, and I smiled wide at him. Our brief talk about making Craig feel better had completely blindsided me about why I was there to begin with. I nodded wildly. “Yeah, man, I’m so excited!”

He grinned at me. “That sure cheered you up quick.”

I rolled my eyes, rising to my feet and stretching my legs. “Craig cheers me up.”

“Well, get ready, because he was such an asshole when he was a kid.”

“He’s an asshole now.”

Kenny snorted. “True. Okay, so, wait here. I’ll be right back.”

I nodded, and watched him leave in the direction of -- I was pretty sure -- was his bedroom. I didn’t know what he was doing, or getting, or up to, or whatever, so I just paced around the room absently, staring at the not-so-clean looking walls that were kind of gross, but gave the apartment . . . character, was a good word for it.

Kenny came back about a minute later, an older-looking laptop in his hands. It was open, and he was typing on it with one hand, while also watching where he was going, while also not tripping on anything, and I was incredibly jealous of his ability to multitask.

He glanced up and nodded to the couch, and, when I sat down in my original seat, he sat down next to me. “Okay, so every time I get a new computer, I always make sure to transfer over files that I think are important.” He set the computer on the coffee table and leaned forward to click on certain files, and type in keywords, and he mumbled as he worked. “I’ve kept these videos since we took them. I don’t know why, but I just like to look back at them every once in a while. Makes me feel like a kid again.”

I nodded, though I didn’t really get what he meant, because I fucking hated being a kid, so I didn’t say anything, I just waited some more until he found apparently, what he was looking for: it was a folder filled with videos of younger-looking children, and they were varying lengths, with varying ages, but I was immediately intrigued. Especially when he played the first video, and it included little . . . tiny . . . kid-Craig.

And the first time I saw little Craig -- extremely small, with the same style chullo hat on his head and fully clad in blue -- my heart almost melted. He was the cutest thing in the whole world, and, coming from me, that’s actually extremely rare for me to admit, because I’m not really one for recognizing cute things. He had the same blank look on his face all the time, and spoke in the same monotone voice, and would flip off the camera almost every time he caught sight of it.

Kenny showed me a bunch of videos, from all different ages, but mostly they were videos of complicated problems that seemed way too thought-out than you’d expect from a group of kids, (in one, Cartman organized a gang that he called the “Skull and Bones”, and he was assigning positions to every kid in their class; Craig was a ‘soldier’, following the orders of Stan, and he did _not_ look too happy about it . . . though, he didn’t look too happy about being there to begin with), but probably my favorite video of all the videos I’d seen was of eleven-year-old Craig, unsuspecting that he was on camera, in his bedroom with an empty fishbowl on his head, and in a full-body snow suit. His voice was slightly muffled, but you could still hear clearly what he was saying.

“Another pleasant day on Jupiter.”

He walked around his room slowly, bouncing up and down like he was walking on the moon. “Oxygen levels: adequate. Temperature: tolerable. Vision: pretty good. Inhabitants of Jupiter: friendly, but kind of stupid.” I had to pause the video to laugh at that, and even Kenny let out a few chuckles at how fucking _ridiculous_ Craig was as a kid.

Without warning, he shouted, “Oh, no!” and assumed some kind of home-made karate defensive stance. “A Martian coming straight for us! And it’s got a nuclear reactor the size of a rocket launcher, capable of wiping out the entire human race! How are we going to stop it?!”

In a slightly deeper voice, shifting his position so that his hands were on his hips and his chest was puffed out, he said, “Don’t worry, ma’am! Spaceman Craig is here to save the day! With my telekinetic powers, I can steal the reactor straight from this mother fucker’s hands!” Craig put two fingers from each hand to his temples, and stared with narrowed eyes at the Terrance and Phillip poster on his wall.

The camera started shaking, as Kenny, (who admitted to being the cameraman from the small space in Craig’s closet), started laughing.

After a few seconds of silence, Craig’s posture slouched slightly and he faked like he was holding the ‘nuclear reactor.’ “Yes! Spaceman Craig has successfully disarmed the Martian asshole, leaving it defenseless and completely at my mercy! What shall I do with it? Shall I kill it? Spare it and send it on it’s way? Or should I arrest it, take it back to earth, and put it in the most heavily-guarded cell in Guantanamo Bay? So many options, and almost all sound so appealing!”

He suddenly leapt forward -- nuclear reactor forgotten -- and made clicking noises as he pretended to put handcuffs on the alien. “You’re coming with me!”

He dragged the invisible alien straight towards the closet. The camera suddenly took a nosedive, and, as the closet door swung open, you could hear an indignant, slightly afraid exclamation of,

“ _What the living fuck, Kenny?!_ ”

Kenny in the video shouted as there was the distinct noise of someone getting punched before the video ended.

Kenny informed me that Craig had broken his nose, and Kenny never spied on him again.

I spent a couple hours more with Kenny, playing poker and drinking coffee, (Kenny liked it too, just not as much as me), before I realized that it was pitch black outside, so I checked my phone to see what time it was, and my eyes almost bugged out of my head when my phone read 10:09.

“Fuck, man, it’s so late!” I screeched, standing up from the kitchen chair so quickly, it clacked to the floor behind me, but that just made me jump in surprise, and I yelped helplessly, gripping my hair tightly.

“You want me to walk you back?” Kenny asked, already standing up.

I nodded jerkily, and said, “GAH! Yeah, please.”

Kenny nodded back, but didn’t say anything; he just went to grab his coat from the hanger by the front door, slipped it on, and gestured for me to do the same. And after I did, he grabbed his key, and we walked back to my dorm room, which wasn’t too far, but it was really, really cold and really, really dark, so it felt like it took forever.

When we got back to my dorm building, he stopped by the front door and said, “You good?”

I nodded, and gave him a smile. “Yeah. Thanks, Kenny.”

Kenny smiled back. “Anytime. Have a good night, Tweek.”

“You, too.”

The dorm room was dark when I unlocked the door. There wasn’t a light on, Craig’s computer wasn’t shining a blinding blue light in his face, (Craig always kept in at the brightest setting), and his phone was dimly illuminated on his bedside table. I could just barely make out Craig’s form on his bed, facing the wall, in the light of the full moon. I wasn’t sure what I expected when I got back, (though I figured it probably should’ve been that), and, for some reason, I was still disappointed. I had kind of hoped he’d be awake, and worried about me, even if he didn’t text me asking where I was, or if I was okay, but I knew he’d had a bad couple days, so I tried to push my disappointment into the back of my mind and focused on him.

I walked over to my bed, dropping my textbooks on the mattress heavily, (I was going to wake him up to get him to spill to me, anyway, I wasn’t exactly above being passive-aggressive like that), and I unzipped my coat, letting it drop on the floor carelessly. I immediately went over to Craig, before I could lose my nerve, and I whispered to him,

“ _Craig_. . .”

I heard him huff -- I fucking _heard_ him -- but he didn’t move. That asshole was awake, he was just ignoring me. That made my irritation with him flare up, and I prodded him with my index finger right in the spine, and said,

“GAH! _Craig_!”

He groaned, but still didn’t answer me, and I figured that that was the last straw. I straightened up, walked over to my bed and flipped on the lamp on my bedside table. I looked over at him, and saw that he was breathing heavily, and still clearly not sleeping, and that irritated me even more, so I made my obnoxious twitching noises -- which was partially unintentional but worked to my advantage. Craig still didn’t move, even though, had he been sleeping that _definitely_ would’ve woken him up.

So I grabbed a pillow, marched to his side of the room, and smashed it on his face as hard as I could.

He sat up immediately, making a weird sputtering sound, and he glared up at me. I could see the shouts about to roll off his tongue, so I spoke over him, my voice conveying every single bit of me that was extremely frustrated by his ‘ignore and avoid’ tactic.

“Fucking _talk_ to me, man!”

His posture straightened up, and there was no hesitation before he was shouting back, “What the fuck is your problem? I’m trying to sleep here!”

_Quit lying and stop avoiding me!_

“No!” I yelled at the top of my lungs. “ _You’re_ the one with the fucking problem!”

Craig seemed to have faltered at my sudden shout, but he caught up quickly enough. “How do _I_ have a problem? I’m acting like I always do. I don’t give a shit about any _one_ , or any _thing_.”

That was such a blatant lie that it actually made me angrier. Because Craig did care about people, and things, he cared so much. Or, at least, I _thought_ he did. He didn’t act like it, but I was so sure he was a good person underneath that whole blank expression, and, even though my mind was going crazy with half-formed comforts that I could have offered him, the best I could come up with was, “You give a shit about me!” Because I had subconsciously decided that I was his best friend, (he had told me so many times before), and that I was a good place to start to talk him off the edge. I was going to go with guinea pigs next, and then Red Racer, if he gave me the chance to continue.

But then he yelled, his face horribly disfigured into a dangerous scowl, “No, I don’t!”

I . . . hadn’t expected that response, and as a gut-reaction, I sucked a breath in through my teeth. That was going to be nightmare material for weeks; I’d have to set an alarm to make sure I woke up before him until the nightmares went away. But it wasn’t true, it couldn’t be true, not with all that evidence that he did give a shit blaring at the front of my mind.

“Yes you do! You _told_ me you do! Why would you lie about that?”

“I lied about that because I’m a dick!”

Craig’s voice was so loud that my heart skipped a beat at the abrupt increase of volume, but I refused to let him see that, and kept up my scowl, even when he jumped to his feet, his posture so threatening that my past self would have fled as soon as we made eye contact.

“I don’t care about you, or your anxiety, or the fact that you have to drink four pots of coffee a day in order to function like a normal human being!”

Those insults were just . . . _argument_ insults, he was just trying to insult me because he was . . . he was _angry_ and needed to vent to someone, I got it, I’d been through shit like that before, but I was not about to let him ruin us because he was so pissed that he wanted to excommunicate his best friend.

So I balled my fists and said, “You’re lying!”

“No, I’m not!”

I narrowed my eyes. “Yes, you are! You’ve been treating me so nice all this time, why would you do that if you don’t care?!” It was a sound argument, one that I didn’t think he’d be able to answer to logically, without throwing his hurt self under the bus. Because he fucking _did_ care about me, and he needed someone to remind him.

And he clearly didn’t know how to answer that, because he averted his wide eyes, his mouth opening and closing in the attempt. “I . . .” After a few brief seconds of grappling, he lifted his gaze, and said, his voice losing it’s ferociousness, and instead lowering into this weird, calm rage that was even _worse_ , “Tweek, if you think I treat you any better than any of the other dumbass dickholes I have to deal with every day, then you’re fucking delusional.”

The words hurt way more than I expected them to, but I tried to push it aside. “But I’m _not_ just another dumbass dickhole!” My voice was shakier than I wanted it to be, and it even cracked like a fourteen year old boy, and I tried to force down my emotions to keep handling the problem in front of me. Like Craig would, if he were me. “You care about me, I _know_ you do --”

Craig’s scowl fell. His eyes narrowed. He had resigned himself to complete and utter apathy, which was what made the words that left his mouth next even fucking worse.

“You think I _care_ about you? You think you actually _matter_ to me? Because you fucking don’t, you . . . you stupid, needy, _faggot_!”

My heart collapsed, and my eyes widened, and my tear ducts almost burst. But his expression didn’t change. His eyes didn’t lose that coldness, and his voice didn’t lose it’s edge as he continued,

“You’re not special, Tweek! You’re not an exception, and you’re _not_ my best friend!”

All of my organs shut down in the most painful way possible, and I couldn’t move, and everything around me faded to black as I tried to process what the fuck had just happened. Craig just stared at me, that same blank stare, for a few more seconds, before some _grand_ realization came to him, and he eased back, his eyes softening and his pulled-tight lips relaxing.

He took a step forward, my peripheral vision telling me he was reaching a hand out to me, and, while I was still frozen, I just stared at him.

“Tweek . . .”

But I didn’t want to hear it. The sound of his voice had destroyed me. It made me crack, and I let everything that happened -- all the confusion, the anger, the misplaced worry -- collect in my throat, before I forced that combined emotion to my right fist, which I then placed forcefully into the side of Craig’s face.

He stumbled back, almost falling over completely, before looking up at me with wide, shocked eyes. Don’t know why he was so shocked. He needed a fist in the face. And more.

And so that’s what I gave him, I gave him more, because he still thought he should’ve been speaking.

“ _Tweek_ \--”

 _Kick him in the shin_ , by brain commanded, somehow enraged and oddly calm at the same time.

 _Good, now grab his head . . . yes, and knee him as hard as you can, right in his stupid, lying, dickface nose_.

When Craig stumbled back onto his bed, I started pacing wildly, unsure of what to do with my build-up of energy, so I grabbed hold of my hair, and yanked as hard as I could. I vaguely noticed the strands that I had grabbed came right out of my head, but it wasn’t the first time that had happened, most fucking definitely wouldn’t be the last time, so I ignored it, dropping the hair to the floor, and started pulling again. I . . . didn’t know what to do. My world had crumbled, and I just . . . it was an in-the-moment reaction, and I was sure it would hit me harder the longer I had to sit on it, but I couldn’t fucking calm myself down, it wasn’t fucking possible, everything hurt too much, my brain was shaking, my eyes wild and trying to soak in everything, even if you couldn’t soak in emotions through your eyes.

“You don’t get to say that!” I shouted, but my voice didn’t sound right, like it was underwater, and it belonged to someone else, someone crazier, someone who had lost complete touch with reality. “Not you! You can’t do this to me!”

My thoughts were interrupted by Craig’s sand-papery voice. “Tweek, I didn’t --”

But I didn’t want to _fucking_ hear it.

“No! This isn’t fair! You weren’t supposed to do this! _Not you!_ ”

_You were my everything --_

_I never want to talk to you again --_

_I would’ve rathered you be a demon-possessed psychopath with the intent to eat my soul, because at least then you could’ve made me hate you!_

The fact that Craig, in my mind at the time, was worse than a literal demon, made me calm down, for some dumb reason that I was too hysterical to think about at the time. So I closed my eyes, because I couldn’t handle looking at that wide-eyed, innocent, ‘I’m-the-victim’ expression on Craig’s face, and I found that, once I couldn’t see anything, my brain actually started to breath somewhat regularly.

I wanted Craig to hurt. I wanted to hurt Craig as badly as he hurt me -- no, _worse_ , I wanted to destroy him, and I had no plan to talk to him ever fucking again, so that was my chance to get out the rage that would no doubt build inside of me until I committed literal homicide.

And when I opened my eyes again, Craig looked like he was on the chopping block, like I was going to kill him and bury him under the floorboards like that Edgar Allan Poe story we read earlier in the semester in my English Composition class. But that’s all he probably cared about; I could’ve beaten him up if I wanted to, the moment was my oyster, he had no control, so he was probably scared he was going to end up on the missing person’s list if he didn’t play his cards just right.

I looked him up and down, before settling on his eyes. His electric blue eyes. “You don’t want to be my best friend? _Fine_.” Fuck, my voice was fucking scary, even I could tell. “I just think it’s really sad. You know, I actually _trusted_ you.”

 _And look what you made me_.

“I actually thought you were a decent person, who actually cared about somebody, _anybody_.” The tears that I’d tried to keep away from my cheeks welled up, and a few fell as I narrowed my eyes at him. “But I was wrong. You’re just like everybody else.”

I let my words sink in, before I decided that he didn’t look hurt enough, he didn’t look like his entire world was slipping through his fingers, not like mine was. I wanted his heart to explode, like mine was. I wanted his soul to _bleed_ , like mine was.

“No,” I said finally, keeping my voice just above a whisper. “No, you’re _not_ like everybody else. You’re _worse_. You made me like you. You made me think that we were such good friends that I could confide my secrets to you without worrying about you taunting me, or making me feel _wrong_ , or spreading it around to everybody. Maybe you didn’t tell anyone. But the fact that you were pretending to be okay with it . . .”

_If you hate faggots, why did you let me be happy?_

“You lead me on. You _betrayed_ me.” I dropped my blank expression and glowered at him with every bit of loathing that I could scrounge. “And I _hate_ you.”

 _So much_. . .

Craig’s entire face melted and he looked like an entirely different person. His wall was down. That brick wall that was Craig’s personality had been _crushed_ by a wrecking ball, and only _then_ did I back off. I took in his expression, I tried to brand it into my mind, so that whenever his screamed words of, _I don’t care about you_ , and, _you’re a needy faggot_ , came rolling through my mind again, I could attempt to take comfort in the fact that I got him back.

When I couldn’t take the sight of him anymore, I screeched silently and spun around on my heels, marching back to my bed and angrily and yet robotically grabbing my coat. I didn’t _really_ have anywhere to go, but my brain didn’t really think about that at the time, it just had one thought running through it, and that was to find the one person I had left in this world to trust.

_Kenny. Find Kenny._

And I didn’t even really think about the fact that it was really late, or that I had _just_ left his apartment, and he was probably sick of me, all I could about was getting away and shouting and screaming and--and _ARGH_! My thoughts were driving me crazy, I couldn’t be alone with my thoughts, I would’ve lost everything that made me Tweek, but maybe, at the same time, that might’ve been a good thing, because it didn’t seem like many people liked me the way I was so maybe changing might’ve --

As my thoughts raced through my head, flitting from one to another PowerPoint presentation on fast forward, I started pulling my coat on, but, as soon as one of the sleeves were wrapping warmly around one of my arms, I realized just what the fuck I was doing. That wasn’t _my_ coat, that was fucking _Craig’s_ coat, bought with his money, (probably stained with the blood of everybody else he mutilated), and I didn’t fucking want it. So I threw it away from me, angry with myself for even _thinking_ of wearing the clothing of a man I personally deemed worse than a demon.

So I started to the door, instead, but, before I could even touch the knob, Craig called out, his voice shaking and watery,

“Wait, Tweek! Where are you going?”

I growled. _Like you care_. But I didn’t say this, I just looked at him over my shoulder, and showed him my almost-perfect blank look that I’d stolen after staring at him extensively when he wasn’t paying attention. “I’m going to Kenny’s apartment. Maybe _he_ can be my best friend.”

And then I left, leaving that stupid fucking . . . crush I had for that _asshole_ behind me.

It took only a few seconds of resting my back on the closed dorm room door, my brain running in circles at roadrunner speed, before I felt all the energy in my body shoot to my legs, and I was sprinting down the hallway, down the three flights of stairs, out the front door into the blistering cold, in the direction of Kenny’s apartment. It was hard to see where I was going, because in the short time since I’d been in my dorm room, the faint sprinkling of half-rain, half-snow had started coming down faster, and the dim lights of the street lamps could only go so far.

About halfway there, I slipped on a patch of ice and fell hard on my ass, hissing in pain but only allowing myself a moment of relishing the pain, before I was on my feet again, running faster than I had been before.

When I got to Kenny’s apartment building, I flung the door open, and ran up the stairs, and, when I got to room number 212, I knocked on the door as hard as I could with my fists, not letting up for a second to hear if someone was coming to let me in.

After, maybe, thirty seconds or so, I dropped to my knees, giving up entirely and just completely breaking down; and I’m not joking, I was full-on sobbing, tears streaming down my face so fast I couldn’t even feel them leaving my eyes anymore, it was like I had two Niagara Falls right on my face, and I curled into myself, resting my head on the door and screeching my pain out.

A few seconds later, the door gave way, and I fell backwards, landing on . . . someone’s feet, (probably Kenny’s), but I didn’t have the energy anymore to get up, because my legs were throbbing, and my head was pounding, and my chest was almost non-existent, while also being the only thing I could really pay attention to, and all this shit was happening, and I just barely recognized my shift in position when Kenny pulled me to my feet, tugging me inside and saying . . . something to me, I don’t know, nothing was processing the right way, and I felt like I was going _crazy_. I was pushed onto a couch, but, even though I felt a calming hand running through my frozen hair, I couldn’t stop, I wasn’t fucking capable of it, because the events of the night kept repeating in my mind and there was nothing that Kenny could do to make the pain go away.

I can’t really remember much of that night, except at some point I completely passed out, with my head throbbing and my face sticky and sore. 

* * *

When I woke up, I was laying haphazardly on Kenny’s couch, my head propped up uncomfortably on the stiff, cheap couch cushion. There was a blanket draped over me, and I groaned, pulling it off of me and struggling into a sitting position, which hurt more than I can even explain. I rubbed at my eyes, yawning widely and trying to remember what the fuck had happened to me. Because one minute I was in my apartment, having a . . . forceful discussion with Craig, and the next I was --

Oh.

Right.

I let out a long sigh, but forced the aftermath tears away. I was done with that. I didn’t want to do it, not that day, at least.

“Tweek?” a soft voice called from the doorway of the living room. “You’re awake?”

I turned around, and saw Kenny standing there, a baby blue apron tied around his waist and a spatula in his hand. He had a smile on his face, but he was clearly forcing it; there was a strain in the wrinkles around his eyes.

I nodded, which I immediately regretted because my head was killing me. “Yeah . . .” I winced at the sound of my voice. It was scratchy and sore.

“Good,” Kenny said and he gestured me to follow him into the kitchen. I reluctantly did.

There was a full pot of coffee sitting on the counter, steam still billowing from it, and there were eggs cooking on the stove. Kenny set the spatula down on a towel on the counter by the oven, and he walked over to where I was loitering awkwardly in the doorway, and he gently pushed me into a chair at the table. I was too tired to resist, so I just . . . let him manhandle me.

Without asking, Kenny poured me a mug of coffee, setting it down in front of me, and he gave me a small smile when I immediately went to drink it.

“How’s your head?” he asked calmly, as if tending to an emotionally distraught Tweek Tweak was an average Thursday morning activity.

“Hurts,” I murmured.

“You want some ibuprofen?”

I nodded, slower and more careful. “Yes, please.”

“Okay.” Kenny walked over to the stove, turned it off, and flipped the eggs onto a ready plate on the counter by the coffee. He set the spatula in the sink, and then dropped the plate in the middle of table -- as if he expected me to eat any of it -- and then went to untie his apron from the back, and, when he did, he draped it over the chair across from me, and said, “Okay, I’ll be right back.”

I nodded, careful again, but didn’t say anything.

I tried to keep my mind as blank as I possibly could until Kenny came back, because leaving me alone with my thoughts when I was in that state was a terrible, terrible idea, and even I knew that. And, thank fuck, it didn’t take Kenny all that long, before he was bustling back into the kitchen with a white medicine bottle in his hand. He cranked open the child lock, tapped two into his palm and then handed them to me.

“Do you need water?” he asked.

I blinked at him, before shaking my head, and downing both pills at the same time with a short gulp of coffee.

Kenny hummed, but didn’t say anything at that. He just walked across the kitchen again, grabbed two forks from a drawer, and then came back, handing one to me. “Eggs?”

I groaned, and shook my head. “No . . . thank you.”

He sighed deeply. “You should eat something, Tweek --”

“I’m not hungry, really --”

“I don’t want you to get sick --”

I groaned again, rubbing at my throbbing eyes. “Just let me . . . let me be for a second . . . please?”

There was a beat of silence from Kenny’s end before he let out a sharp breath. “Fine. Okay. Fine. And I’m not going to force you to do it now, but you are going to tell me what happened. I’ve never seen . . . anyone like what you were last night, in my entire life.”

I nodded slowly. “I know. I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have to be sorry, Tweek,” Kenny said immediately. “I’m happy you came to me, at least, instead of just wandering the streets in the middle of the night, without a coat, in a snowstorm.”

I didn’t know what to say to that, so I just stayed silent and took a long, comforting gulp of coffee. And then another one. And then another one. And then I wasn’t even letting myself breath in between drinks, I was just chugging the whole thing, letting the bitter liquid burn me on the way down.

When it was all gone, I looked up at Kenny and he was staring at me, his eyes sad and his lips quirked down in a sympathetic frown. I didn’t want to see him look like that. He was worried about me. At least, I thought he was?

“Are you okay?” I asked meekly, dragging the bottom of the coffee mug along the table absentmindedly.

Kenny didn’t answer for a long time. He stood up, instead, and grabbed the coffee pot from the counter and brought it over so he could top me off. He filled it as full as it could go, and I wrapped my fingers around the cup appreciatively.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” he said finally, his voice too . . . unKennylike for my taste. Kenny was supposed to be . . . happy, and he was supposed to be laughing, and making jokes, and teasing me, and I was supposed to be laughing back, and I was supposed to gushing about . . . about Craig, because there were so many things that I could gush about Craig, but everything about him that I loved was . . . not where it was supposed to be. It wasn’t . . . anywhere. It was gone. Everything was gone.

“But _you’re_ not,” Kenny’s soft, accusing voice cut through my broken thoughts.

I wanted to deny it, but I didn’t have to energy to. And it would clearly be a lie, and Kenny would’ve seen right through it, so I shrugged, but didn’t say anything.

“What happened with Craig?”

I groaned at his name, shaking my head.

“Did he . . . hit you? I don’t see anything --”

“He . . . he didn’t hit me,” I mumbled, drinking more of my coffee. “It wasn’t like that.”

“Then what was it like?” Kenny asked immediately, clearly relieved that he was getting me to talk.

I wasn’t sure how I felt about that.

“It’s over, Kenny,” I said, gnawing on my bottom lip roughly. “Everything’s okay. Nothing’s the same. And I don’t know what to do.”

Kenny was quiet for a beat before he spoke again. “What changed?”

“Craig did,” I said simply, taking one, two, three, seven gulps of coffee until the mug was empty.

“How?”

“I . . . I don’t know.”

“Well . . . what happened then?”

“Craig . . . _informed_ me . . .” I let out a rough sigh, reaching across the table and pouring myself another cup. “He . . . he’s _not_ my best friend anymore.”

“I sort of got that vibe from you last night,” Kenny said with a frown. “You kept screaming, ‘I hate Craig’ at the top of your lungs, but you wouldn’t tell me why.” I didn’t answer, I just immediately drank more of the coffee and stared at the table, condemning the dark stains on the surface from previous owners.

“ _Tweek_ ,” Kenny said, and his tone of voice drew my attention up, and I saw that he was dragging an exhausted hand down his face. He must’ve been irritated that I kept spacing out. “What the fuck happened?”

I chewed on my bottom lip, quirking my eyebrows as I tried to think of how best to articulate what happened while trying to keep as much of the white hot emotion out of the equation as possible.

“Craig . . . he did something . . .”

Beat of silence. “Okay, what did he do?”

“Well, no he didn’t really . . . do anything . . . he . . . called me something.” I cleared my throat, and drank more coffee. It wasn’t even all that good; but it was coffee, and it was what I needed most.

Kenny drummed his fingers absently on the table to some beat of some song that I didn’t know. “I really don’t like the sound of that . . . what did he call you?”

“He called me, um . . . the . . . the ‘f’ word.” I let out a shaky breath, because I had just said it out loud, and now that it was out loud, it felt horribly real.

Kenny’s new batch of silence felt more painful than all the other times. I chanced a glance up at him, but his face was unreadable, blanker than blank, like a mannequin. “What f word?” he asked stiffly.

I looked down again. It was . . . more embarrassing to talk about than I figured it should’ve been, but I felt shame shake my muscles and my bones as I tried to keep myself grounded. “NGH! The one that . . . the one that you’re thinking about.”

There was even fucking more silence, so I distracted myself by drinking the rest of my coffee, and, the second I had set the mug back down on the table, Kenny hissed angrily, “He fucking _what_?”

I jolted at how angry he sounded, because I really, seriously was not expecting that reaction. “We . . . got in a fight, and he told me that he doesn’t care about me, and that . . .” I felt the tears coming again, but I blinked them away again, reaching anxiously across the table for the coffee pot again, and, as I poured it shakily, I said, “And that I wasn’t important to him, and that he never actually cared about me, and that I was a . . . a needy . . .” I groaned, putting the coffee pot down and wrapping my hands around the hot mug. “You know.”

I didn’t dare look up at Kenny, because I knew he was angry, and I didn’t want to see anymore anger for the rest of my life, because that was the worst fight I’d ever had, and will ever have, because it was my best friend, the first guy I’ve ever loved, and he told me that I wasn’t important to him.

Without warning, Kenny scraped the chair out as he stood up, picking his apron up off the floor when he noticed it had fallen from his abrupt movement, before he turned away towards the door.

“Wait, Kenny! Where’re you going?” I asked, bewildered, wiping at my somewhat-dry eyes.

“I’m going to punch that asshole right in the balls,” Kenny spat to me, not pausing a moment before stalking out of the room.

I scrambled to my feet, hurrying after him, even though my head was shouting at me, and my legs were screaming, and everything told me to just let whatever was about to happen, happen. But there was something else that was making me move, and, whatever that something was, it made me grab Kenny by the shoulder, and tug him around to face me. I immediately shrunk away from the absolutely furious look on his face, (I really, really did not expect him to be that angry), and stuttered out,

“GAH! NGH! No, Kenny, don’t do _that_ \--”

“Why not?” he hissed, folding his arms over his chest and glaring at me. “You of all people should want that --”

“ _I don’t!_ ” I screeched, before I realized what I had said, and I clapped a hand over my mouth. I looked around wildly, trying to figure out where that had come from.

Kenny quirked his eyebrows at me, his anger being somewhat replaced with confusion. “What? Why not?”

I grappled with my words for a few seconds, before managing out a nearly-incoherent, “Just . . . he may be an insensitive, fucking asshole, with no concept of normal human emotion that cares about no _body_ and no _thing_ , and probably _does_ deserve someone to fucking _castrate_ him --” I sucked in a breath at my last, extremely forceful statement, before letting it out slowly, squeezing my eyes shut as I tried to relax. “But -- GAH! -- He doesn’t . . . _actually_ deserve it. I just . . . I _never_ want to talk to him again, I want to fucking _forget_ he ever existed.”

Kenny studied me with an expression so serious it was almost funny, if I had any fraction of a sense of humor left. And it took for-fucking-ever before Kenny answered, and all he said was, “Are you sure?”

I nodded. “I’m sure.”

He still looked uncertain, but he nodded anyway, and I let out a breath, happy that I wasn’t going to have to actively stop him from hurting Craig.

He probably already had a black eye. And a massive bruise on his shin. And an even bigger bruise on his nose. Anything Kenny had planned would just be insult to injury, and while that might have been okay in some capacity, it just wasn’t worth having to see him again so soon.

Or ever, really.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Also, Nikiel was in the original copy of this chapter, but, seeing as I cut it in two, you'll see him next chapter, I promise!


	16. Tweek's Very Own Chapter: Part II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, Part II!

I’d pretty quickly learned that, because I’d gotten used to being best friends with Craig, to suddenly not have him around me at all hours of the day except for the times that I was at class, or was hanging out with Kenny for some much-needed ranting about Craig, was really hard.

One of the worst parts about losing him was having to walk places by myself, and I mean, I _could’ve_ asked Kenny, but he was just too busy all the goddamn time, because of his four jobs and school and stuff, and he wouldn’t want to waste what free time he did have on me anymore than he already did. But I fucking clung to him, because after Craig, I didn’t have anyone, I was alone, and even though I’d been alone for my entire life, I had gotten so used to being with Craig, that being left to my thoughts was fucking killing me.

I missed him. My heart was heavy all the fucking time. I missed playing cards with him, and watching Red Racer with him, and laughing with him and having the option to selfishly hug him whenever I wanted, because every time I did, he always hugged me back, and I had never known someone who would even want to touch me at all, and I had also never known someone that I wanted to touch, because I was always terrible at physical contact, but he changed that, of _course_ he changed that, because Craig changed everything, and sometimes I wished he didn’t.

But, while my thoughts were always loud and angry when I was by myself, there were times where Kenny would spare some of his time, and use it on me.

Two days after my fight with Craig, Kenny forced me out of his apartment to get some coffee, and, on the walk to the coffee house, Kenny informed me that he had told Butters about my feelings for Craig, and how shitty everything had ended up. If it were anyone else other than Kenny, I probably would’ve had a problem with that, but, (even though I had no idea why), I trusted Butters, too, I guess. Kenny and Butters made a nice couple, a couple that I wouldn’t mind spending a lot of time with, because it wasn’t like hanging out with Kyle and Cartman, (who were one of the most annoying, hands-on, bickering couple I’d ever met), or Wendy and Stan, (who had broken up with each other and then almost immediately got back together in the short time I’d known them and, when they were together, were extremely mushy and romantic and disgusting). Even though Kenny made a lot of innuendos, and called Butters every pet name in the book, I could handle them, because they didn’t ignore Craig and I, in favor of each other. They were able to love each other, and not be entirely wrapped up in each other’s existence. That was the sort of relationship I wanted, and I actually liked being around them. Not as much as I liked being around Craig, but that was to be expected.

I would’ve kept half-listening to Kenny as he rambled through a long-winded speech about Butters’ grades and how wonderful he was, (which did a somewhat nice job of taking my mind off of the entire situation that I was in, but also reminded me of what I had lost when the whole shitstorm had happened), but a blue hat caught my attention out of the corner of my eye, and, without thinking, I jerked my head to see if it was what I thought it was. Because I _knew_ what it was, I could pick that fucking hat out of a crowd a mile away, and, sure enough, walking with his hands in his pockets and his eyes fixed at the sky was fucking _Craig_. Craig _Tucker_.

I yelped, (involuntarily), and, in the hopes that Craig didn’t hear me, I hid behind Kenny’s back.

Kenny made a startled noise, but I guess he figured out the situation quickly enough, because he pulled me into an alley that was nearby until the danger could pass.

But, as much as I never wanted to see Craig again, I couldn’t help myself from peeking from around the corner, despite Kenny’s voice hissing at me to not fucking do that, if I didn’t want him to see me. Craig was far enough away that I had the chance to get a real, long, good look at him.

He looked fucking terrible. Face pale, a very pronounced black eye, dark circles around both eyes that screamed ‘no sleep’, blank face somehow blanker than normal. But, as bad as the thought was, I felt a part of me feel really, really fucking _good_ that he looked fucking terrible, because I looked fucking terrible, too. Maybe that makes me a bad person, but in that moment, I didn’t really care for two reasons: 1), it meant that Craig would’ve possibly missed me as much as I fucking missed him, and 2), he _gutted_ me, and it was extremely satisfying to see the aftermath.

Yeah, so I was _definitely_ a horrible person, now that I’m thinking about it, but, seriously, at the time, my head was fucked to Denver and back, and I was so distracted by the tornado in my chest that I really seriously, didn’t give a single fuck.

Guess I had taken after Craig more than I had originally thought.

But, as robotic as Craig’s movements were, there was this sudden moment where his entire body tensed, and his head jerked down so that he was staring at his feet. His face was shadowed slightly, but there was a darkness to his eyes that hadn’t been there three seconds before.

I quirked my eyebrows, because tensing and having his facial expression darken so suddenly wasn’t something Craig normally did. And then he started walking faster, which was even _weirder_ , because Craig didn’t believe in hurrying, for any reason at all.

But then even more of Craig came into view, and I saw what he was hurrying away from.

I bared my teeth, my hands balling into fists at my sides, and my eyes narrowing as I took in the sight of Craig briskly walking away from Nikiel.

That fucking dickless asshole with the big, dumb obnoxious smile and the handsy . . . fucking _hands_ , prick should’ve been fucking _fired_ for that --

And, even though Craig’s really long legs could carry him pretty fast if he wanted them to, this asshole caught up to him, and was walking right next to him, his arms swinging by his sides casually. He started speaking, but Craig kept his eyes straight forward once he realized that he probably wasn’t going to escape the asshole, considering how crowded the sidewalks were and how persistent Nikiel was.

Nikiel was saying something that apparently didn’t sit right with Craig, because his blank face was no longer blank anymore -- it was very, very irritated.

They exchanged some words, before the dreaded something happened that I’d been kind of expecting, but hoped wouldn’t happen anyway:

Nikiel lifted his arm to wrap it around Craig. _My_ \-- well, not _my_ Craig, my _old_ Craig. The Craig I used to have.

But Craig must’ve seen this coming, too, because he used one hand to shove Nikiel away from him. That asshole almost fell into the fucking road, ‘cause I guess he expected Craig to actually fall for it? Craig’s not a idiot. He’s a fucking moron, but he’s not an idiot.

But my heart felt lighter at this, but I swallowed it down, because _just_ because Craig didn’t want Nikiel didn’t magically mean that he was going to start wanting me. Or even liking me. _Tolerating_ me.

They talked some more -- or Nikiel talked happily and Craig shut him down every time -- and, by the time they were about to pass in front of the alley Kenny and I were in, it seemed like Craig was just going to bolt at any second, if that were Craig’s thing. And I was . . . actually a little happy about that, because, even though Craig claimed he wasn’t gay, sometimes I had doubts that he knew for sure if he was or wasn’t. So, he might’ve been severely in the closet, and, if that was true, then rejecting Nikiel repeatedly would just mean that maybe hope wasn’t all lost?

But fuck, that was just the weird optimistic side of me that sometimes decided to poke it’s head through my normal self. Because all that bullshit about _Craig missing me as much as I missed him_ , was just that: complete and utter bullshit. Craig made himself pretty clear back in our dorm room, and the entire four months that I actually fucking allowed Craig to manipulate me into loving him meant fucking nothing. To him, at least.

So, anyway, when it really did look like I was in the clear, Nikiel said something that actually got to Craig, because he stopped walking altogether. His eyebrows were knitted together, his lips pursed, and he stared with narrowed eyes at the easy smile on Nikiel’s face.

Nikiel said something else, which got to Craig even _more_ , because he folded his arms over his chest and mumbled something out of the corner of his mouth.

God fucking dammit, I wished I could’ve heard that conversation, it was driving me nuts just watching it, like I was watching a silent movie without the captions or the shitty show tune music in the background.

A huge grin spread across Nikiel’s face, and my insides twisted and churned at the very sight of that . . . that smug fucking _asshole_ \--

Before I knew what was happening, Nikiel and Craig were walking again, fucking together, like they were old pals or something! I mean, Craig didn’t really look like he wanted to be there, but the fact of the fucking matter was that he _was_ there, and he was going off with some dick that very explicitly wanted to get into his pants!

The two were about to pass the alley that Kenny and I were hiding in, so, to avoid being seen, I allowed Kenny to pull me behind a dumpster, and I strained my ears to hear what the fuck conversation they were having.

“--really isn’t all that big, but it’s perfect for one person.”

“I really don’t care.”

“Hey, man, I’m just warning you. It’s small. There isn’t much room.”

“I seriously don’t give a _single_ fuck.”

“You’re lucky I’m just talking about my apartment! If I was talking about --” Nikiel leaned into Craig, raising an eyebrow. “ _Something else_. . . it would be a _completely_ different story.”

“I don’t care about _that_ , either.”

Their voices were started to grow distant as they passed, but I strained my ears as much as I possibly could, and just barely caught Nikiel’s final words:

“You’re just playing hard to get, baby, you’ll come around --”

My heart dropped into my stomach, and my stomach shot straight up into my throat. I turned around quickly and grabbed the-also-surprised Kenny by the shoulders, shaking him violently, as I screeched, “ _Baby_?! Did he just say _baby_?!”

Kenny pushed me away from him, fixing a stern, almost angry look at me. “Tweek, you’ve gotta just _forget_ that asshole, okay? If he wants to go and get piledrived by some low-paid waiter in a small-ass inner city apartment, then fucking let him --”

“GAH! NGH!” I tugged at my hair, standing up and pacing back in forth in the gross alleyway. “I can’t just fucking _let_ him! What if Craig doesn’t actually want it and he gets raped, or poisoned, or chopped into pieces, and stored in a freezer, and fucking _eaten_! _Jeffrey Dahmer_ did that, for fucking _years_ , and _he_ was gay, and that _waiter’s_ gay, and they’re too similar for me to _not_ worry about, and I hate Craig a whole lot, but I don’t want him to _die_ \--”

Kenny stood, too, and I didn’t realize this until he was easing my hands from my hair, pointing that stern glare at me from before. “Stop it, Tweek. You’re going to drive yourself crazy.”

“GAH! No, but Kenny --”

“No, buts,” he interrupted, shaking his head. “I don’t want you to get hurt again, and if you let Craig back in, I’m worried you will --”

" _I'_ _m not letting him back in_ ,” I snarled, pulling my hands back to my sides. “No fucking way --”

“Then why are you worrying so much?”

I blinked a few times at the question I should’ve seen coming, but somehow didn’t. “I . . . I -- NGH! -- I don’t know, but Craig was the first friend I ever had, and even if we hate each other, that doesn’t mean I want him to get raped and murdered! It doesn’t mean he _deserves_ to get raped and murdered --”

“I’m not saying he deserves to get raped and murdered, and I’m not saying that you want him to, either,” Kenny said, lowering his voice so it wasn’t as harsh as before. “I’m just saying, if you hate him so much, then you should just get him out of your mind. It really will drive you insane if you keep thinking about it --”

I averted my eyes, trying to calm the tornado that was starting up again. “GAH! I’m trying, man, but it’s hard!”

He nodded. “It’s always hard,” he said simply. “You loved him, he hurt you, and now you have to get over him. It’s going to be really hard. But that’s why you _can’t_ torture yourself by obsessing over him. It won’t help you at all. Just stick with me and Butters. _We’ll_ help you, I promise.”

I nodded jerkily, grabbing hold of the front of my shirt, viciously tugging. “GAH! Okay!”

“Okay,” Kenny said, easing up on his yelling at me, and adjusting his coat. “Well, now that we know your asshole ex-best friend isn’t going back to your dorm room, now might be a good time to get some of your stuff? Clothes and textbooks and stuff?”

I forced myself to calm down. It didn’t work. But I pretended it did.

“GAH! NGH! Okay, yeah . . . yeah, good. Uh . . . let’s go.”

Kenny and I had to wait a few seconds, because we were going to have to loop back around, because my dorm room was in the opposite direction that we had been walking earlier, and I was jittery and my muscles were jerking, so I figured I was probably going to be walking a lot faster than normal, so we decided to hang back just so we didn’t run into Craig and . . . _Nikiel_ again.

Going back to my old dorm room wasn’t as scary as I thought it was going to be. I thought it was going to bring back terrible memories, and, while I was gathering all my shit into a duffel bag that I had brought with me when I first came to college, all I could hear in my head was,

_You stupid needy faggot -_

_You stupid needy faggot --_

_I don’t care about you --_

_You stupid needy faggot --_

But Kenny was there to block these thoughts somewhat by just talking nonstop about everything, from improvising a verbal checklist of shit I needed to grab, to what he should make for dinner that night, to what movie we wanted to watch when we got back to his apartment. It helped. Having someone there with me -- someone that I trusted completely, someone that I could tell was going to become the most important person in my life -- made the pain go away.

Okay, so I’m spitting more bullshit, but I had to believe it, or else I would’ve shriveled into a complete waste of a human right on the floor, and I was done feeling like a complete waste of a human. That was the way I had felt my entire life before I met Craig -- eighteen years of feeling like a defective human that was a reincarnation gone wrong, and Craig finally made me feel . . . _not_ like that, but then he left, and I was back to being a nothing.

Only that time I was a much angrier nothing.

In my duffel bag were: my textbooks, two changes of clothes, my lime green coffee mug, my notebook and my small little bag of colored pens and pencils, my earbuds, my toothbrush and other shit like that, and, when Kenny wasn’t looking, the green sweatshirt Craig had given me. I gave a shaky, “Okay, done,” when I was finished and ready to leave, and whatever Kenny had been saying that I interrupted, he stopped, smiled, and nodded.

“Alright, let’s go, then.”

And then we went back to Kenny’s place, and he made me coffee, and announced that he was making spaghetti for dinner, which I decided was a good idea because Kenny made really, really good spaghetti, and then we put on “The Office” off of Stan’s Hulu, and we binged it until the sun went down.

* * *

It was Monday. I had been living with Kenny for a week, and I still had just _under_ a week before final exams began, so I was fucking cramming like fucking crazy, and so was Kenny. We were sitting in the living room, Kenny taking up the couch and the coffee table, and me spread out all around the floor, sitting on a couch cushion with my legs crossed Indian style in front of me as I took inventory of all the books, notebooks, and loose handouts that I’d kept shoved together in two binders. And it seemed like I had remember everything from my dorm room, and I was just about to start in on my English composition notes, when I realized --

“Oh, fuck,” I mumbled, dropping the second assigned textbook for my English composition class on the floor carelessly.

“What’s wrong?” Kenny asked, looking up from his psychology textbook.

I sighed roughly, narrowing my eyes irritably at him. “GAH! I forgot my first English composition textbook.” I turned my attention back to my pile of shit and groaned, “ARGH! _Fuck_!”

“Chill out, dude,” Kenny said calmly, looking back down at his book and flipped a few pages ahead that he had dog tagged. “Are you going to get it? Do you want me to come with you?”

“NGH!” I pulled at my hair and stared down at all of my notes, and I had the sick realization that I needed that textbook if I was going to get any studying done. It was the entire first half of the semester, there was no _way_ I was going to pass the final exam if I didn’t have it. “I have to, man, or I’m gonna fail! _GAH_! I can’t fail, I actually tried really, really hard this semester, if I fail that means I did it all for nothing --”

“Do you want me to come with you?” Kenny repeated, his eyes not even looking up from his book. I wasn’t good with people, and never had/have been, but I knew that that meant he probably didn’t want to, he was just asking to be polite, and I had already been taking so much from him for the past week, that I didn’t know if I steal any more, so I shook my head, (even though he wasn’t looking at me), and said,

“No, man, that’s okay, I can go by myself.”

“Are you sure?” At this, Kenny did glance up, his eyes softened but sharp.

I nodded at him. “Yeah, I’ll be fine. I’ll go when . . .” I cleared my throat, grabbing at the front of my shirt and staring at the floor. “ _He’s_ at environmental science. I . . . I can wait that long. It’s only till tomorrow.”

Kenny shrugged. “If you’re sure.”

“GAH! I’m sure.”

Kenny didn’t answer, he just returned to studying, so I took my attention away from English composition, and moved on to physics, because I knew I _really_ needed to study that, too, and while I’m on the subject, _fuck_ physics, it’s so hard! It’s interesting and all, but it takes so much concentration, and at the time that wasn’t really something that I had a lot of.

I groaned. It was going to be a long day.

* * *

When Tuesday morning rolled around, I sat up on Kenny’s couch and stretched.

(I guess I should mention here that Stan had no idea why I was suddenly living with him and Kenny, but he didn’t really seem to care, because he spent so much time hanging out with Kyle and Cartman and Wendy, so I didn’t really see it as all that big a problem.)

I pulled my phone off of the phone charger, checked the time, and saw that Craig’s class started in half an hour. So I should’ve been alright to head over after I drank a few cups of coffee and brushed my teeth and washed my face and all that boring, monotonous stuff.

So, after I finished all that, I slipped the sweatshirt that Kenny let me borrow until I found a replacement one, (I stashed Craig’s sweatshirt at the very bottom of my duffel bag, but I never looked at it, I just acknowledged the fact that I had grabbed it in a moment of weakness, but I just didn’t have the heart to bring it back), I grabbed my phone and my wallet and my earbuds, and I closed the door after I left. (Kenny already knew where I was going to be, and he didn’t have Tuesday classes, either, so I didn’t bother waking him up, or leaving him a note.)

The walk over was uncomfortably and almost painfully nostalgic, and I felt my heart pound the closer I got to my dorm room, so I slipped my earbuds into my ears, and pressed play on my meditation playlist. It’d been awhile since I’d meditated, and my increase in everything-anxiety had reflected that, so I muttered my favorite chant under my breath as I shoved my hands in the pockets of the sweatshirt and ducked my head to the blowing wind.

The walk there took forever, while also seeming like it happened in, like, three seconds, and, by the time I had entered my dorm building, and climbed up the three flights of stairs, it felt like my soul was going to fly out of my body, and a good majority of me hoped that it would, so it was just my physical self going through the motions, and not my actual human, spiritual self.

It was much, much worse now that I was alone, and Kenny was all the way back at his apartment.

And when I saw dorm room #374 loom into view, my breath hitched and I had to _force_ myself to bring one foot in front of the other, because just the knowledge of what had occured on the other side of that door made my heart palpitate and my hands shake.

I stopped in front of the familiar doorway, and stared at it for a few seconds, before resting my forehead on the thick, white-painted wood, and closing my eyes. I focused on the chiming bells and soothing drums being injected into my ear canal and mumbled,

“ _Asato ma sadgamaya_.”

Most people in my dorm building had classes, and those that didn’t were probably still sleeping, so, even though I knew I looked like a fucking moron, chances were, I wasn’t going to get caught, and Craig had class and was most definitely gone, so I knew for sure that he wasn’t going to be there, so I was good to do a little spur-of-the-moment mediating before I went inside the place that belonged only to the Craig and me of the past.

“ _Tamaso maa jyotir-gamaya_.”

I look long, calm breaths in between chants, letting the words wash over me. That chant in particular always put me in a better place -- I mean, that didn’t mean my life hadn’t fallen to shit around me, it just meant that repeating those words over and over again could somehow make it . . . better? Made me forget about it for a little while, at least.

“ _Mrityor-maa amritam gamaya_.”

I repeated the chant a few more times, before I realized that at that point, I was just stalling, so I straightened my spine, turned up the volume of the calming instrumentals on my phone, and slowly took the key from my pocket. My music always made me a little lethargic, but I figured that it was probably better than freaking the fuck out.

When the door opened, the first thing I noticed was the extremely sickening, thick scent of strong alcohol. It wasn’t, like, overpowering, or anything, but it was noticeable even to me, whose nose was shit at recognizing smells other than coffee. But it wasn’t like _beer_ alcohol, like at the party with Kenny and Butters, or _wine_ alcohol, like my parents would sometimes drink when we had company over for dinner, but it was stronger than that, and I had never really been around much alcohol in my life, so I had no idea what the fuck it was. And what was even stranger about the whole thing, was that, once I got over the foreign smell, I realized that the room that I had expected to be empty . . . wasn’t.

My eyes drifted to Craig’s side, probably just because my subconscious wanted to torture me, and there was a fucking _body_ on Craig’s bed, laying over the blanket, facing the wall. A body wearing black jeans, a blue sweatshirt that was riding up in the back, and an askew blue chullo hat.

“GAH! _Fuck_ ,” I said, way too fucking loudly, before I clapped a hand over my mouth, and backed away slowly towards the hallway. The brief calmness that my chant had given me withered to nothing immediately, and even though Craig stirred pathetically, he didn’t wake up entirely, so in that moment I had a decision to make: risk waking him up, (even though there was a pretty big chance that, if I was quiet enough, he wouldn’t wake up, because, ignoring the fact that he was an extremely light sleeper, he looked super out of it), or just bolting and forgetting all about passing my class.

But, in the end, the thought of failing scared me way more than the thought of an awkward, terrifying interaction with my old best friend, so I took more calm breaths, mouthed the words to the chant again, and padded as softly as I could to my side of the room. My textbook wasn’t on my bed, so I stooped to my knees, lifted the corner of my blanket, (I never made my bed, _ever_ ), and saw it, sitting in the middle of the floor underneath my bed. How it got there... no idea, but I instinctively knew that that was probably where it was. I reached as far as I could to get it, and, after I dragged it with the tips of my fingers, I got a good grip on it, and pulled it towards me.

The wire of my earbuds got wrapped around my knee when I was bent over, so when I stood up, the beautiful distraction from where I actually was was taken away, and I growled angrily, scrambling with my earbuds to try to fit them back in my ears again.

But I guess I growled too loudly, because, before I could get lost in the chiming of bells again, I heard a groggy, deep, husky voice say,

“Ugh . . . Tweek? S’that you?”

I whipped around quickly, my eyes bugging out of my head when I saw Craig on his other side, probably having rolled over at some point when I was in there, and he was staring at me with bloodshot, completely exhausted eyes. He was paler than when I saw him with Nikiel, and he actually looked . . . sick, and I felt a tug of sympathy, but I forced it down with a swallow.

“Uh . . . no?”

I grimaced.

But, to my complete surprise, Craig just squeezed his eyes shut and turned his face away. He made these weird grumbling noises, and I felt the urgent need to sprint away, so I gathered my textbook and, not even bothering to put my earbuds back in, I bolted for the door. Before I could make it into the hallway safely, I heard Craig’s muttered voice say,

“‘Nother dream . . .”

but I was too intent on getting the fuck out of there, that I didn’t really think much of it.

* * *

By the time I got back to Kenny’s apartment, Kenny was already awake, and I could smell the breakfast he was making all the way from the front door, so I tucked my textbook under my arm and bolted in his direction.

Kenny was whistling something as he pushed around some scrambled eggs in a pan and swayed his hips to whatever song was stuck in his head.

“ _GAH! Kenny!_ ”

Kenny jumped, almost throwing the spatula, and he made this weird yelping noise that I’d never heard him make before, but I was too wrapped up in all the events of the morning to laugh at him, or dwell on it anymore than a passing thought. And I also didn’t give him a chance to answer me, I just said,

“I saw Craig!”

and the irritation on Kenny’s face lessened some. “Are you okay?” he asked, setting the spatula down, turning off the stove, and removing the pan from the heat.

“NGH! EHH! I-I . . . I think so, but he looked . . .”

Kenny raised an eyebrow when I just stopped talking. “He looked what?”

“GAH! Like he was _dying_ , man, and I think he was drunk, but it’s only Tuesday, and it’s ten in the morning, and --”

“Tweek,” Kenny interrupted, his voice firm but soft. “Calm down. He’ll be fine. Or not, whatever, it isn’t your problem anymore.” I didn’t like the way he said that, but I tried not to let it bother me too much, even though it was bothering me a whole fucking lot.

“You want some coffee? I just put some on,” Kenny said, turning away, as if his brief little comfort was enough to actually get me to relax.

But I didn’t want to talk his ear off if he didn’t want to hear it, because I was lucky Kenny was putting up with me for so long, and I didn’t want to annoy him, and he seemed to think that he had laid the problem to rest, so I swallowed the terrifying memory of the mental image of Craig on his deathbed.

 _Shove it down. Shove your emotions down_.

I nodded shakily and said, “Yeah -- NGH! -- yes, please.”

* * *

“Hey? Kenny?” I asked, peeking my head sheepishly around the corner of the kitchen to where he was making dinner.

“Yeah?”

“Just . . . what do you think Craig’s doing right now?”

Kenny glanced over his shoulder at me, the hand that was stirring whatever was in the pot stilling as he stared at me. “Probably fucking up his life to the point where he can’t make it better again. Why?”

I gripped the front of my shirt, yanking it back and forth absentmindedly. “GAH! NGH! I-I was just wondering --”

“Well stop it,” Kenny said, turning away again. “I thought you said you hate him now?”

“EHH! I do!” I shouted, looking up at him with wide eyes. “I _do_ hate him!”

“Then why do you kept torturing yourself by thinking about him?” Kenny asked, his voice flat and indifferent.

I didn’t have an answer to that, so I didn’t answer him, instead turning away and walking back to the living, where my first English textbook lay on the coffee table.

* * *

“Hey, Kenny?” I asked, looking up from my book with quirked eyebrows.

“Yeah, Tweek?”

“Do you think Craig’s gonna pass his exams?”

“Couldn’t care less,” Kenny answered blankly, not even looking up from his textbook.

I gnawed on my bottom lip, turning my attention back to my boring, almost illegible scrawled notes. “O-oh. Yeah, me neither.”

* * *

“Kenny?”

A long, irritated sigh. “What is it, Tweek?”

“If Craig’s actually an alcoholic now --”

“Tweek!” Kenny said sternly, his voice a notch above the normal inside voice. “Stop talking about Craig! I don’t care about him, and you shouldn’t care about him, either, like _you_ keep saying! Put him out of your mind!”

I looked down at my hands, my long, uncut fingernails picking at the wound-ridden skin of my palm. “Sorry, I just...”

Kenny sighed slowly. “I know. Just . . . try and forget about it.”

I nodded dutifully. “I’ll try.”

* * *

“Um. Kenny?”

“Yeah, Tweek?”

“If Craig doesn’t pass his classes, does that mean --”

A purposeful throat clear interrupted me. “Tweek, if I hear Craig’s name one more time, I’m going to lock you in the bathroom.”

My eyes widened, because just the _thought_ of being locked anywhere, let alone a fucking bathroom, (the grossest fucking room in the entire fucking house), made my brain start to panic, so I snapped my mouth shut and didn’t say anything else, which was something that Kenny most definitely agreed with, because his face relaxed, and he returned his attention to the breakfast he was cooking.

* * *

I’d managed to at least attempt to get Craig out of my head for the following few days, (even though I had multiple, vivid, heartbreaking dreams about him every fucking night because the universe hated me), but, like always, something came around that brought that asshole back to the very front of my mind.

It wasn’t _Craig_ Craig, but the reminder came in the form of Token and Clyde, (who I hadn’t seen much of in the days after . . . _after_ , mostly because I spent the majority of my time locked in Kenny’s apartment), and they looked like someone had drowned a dog in a vat of molasses while they were forced to watch. They didn’t answer when Kenny asked how they were doing, they just came right inside the living room, and sat down beside each other on the couch, so close their legs were almost touching. Whatever the fuck happened, it had _seriously_ fucked them up.

I had no idea what to do, because I was terrible at cheering up people who were sad, so I just exchanged a confused look with Kenny, and I asked, “GAH! Wh-what’s wrong? Y-you guys look sad --”

Clyde shook his head, running a hand down his face. “Tweek, did Craig’s entire family die, or something?”

I jolted at the question. I probably should’ve expected that it was going to have something to do with Craig, because Token and Clyde were Craig’s best friends for the longest time, and I knew Craig wasn’t doing . . . good, but I didn’t expect the first words out of their mouths to be so _blunt_ and _scary_. And the scariest part of the scary part was, I mean . . .  _fuck_ , Craig’s entire _family_ could’ve died, and I wouldn’t have known because I was too busy _hating_ him!

I shook my head rapidly, reaching a hand to my hair and pulling hard at my lack of answers. “GAH! EHH! U-uh . . . I-I don’t _think_ so --”

“Well, he is seriously fucked up right now,” Clyde said miserably. I had never seen Clyde so . . . serious before; there was only sadness in his eyes, and his lips were drooping, and his body language was all sagged and hunched over, and Token -- calm, collected Token -- looked the exact same as Clyde.

I felt my insides start to tremble. “What do you mean?” I asked quickly, clutching the front of my shirt.

Clyde seemed too beside himself with worry to answer, so Token took over. “We just found Craig passed out drunk in an alley.”

My heart and chest just fucking exploded, my mouth dropping open and my eyes almost popping out of my head in total horror. It had been so fucking long since I’d felt panic so hot running through my body, and I screamed at the top of my lungs, tugging as hard as I fucking could at my hair, “GAH! WH- _WHAT?!_ YOU FOUND HIM -- NGH! _WHAT_?!”

I could vaguely recognize Clyde crying, but my entire world was in shambles all around me, and it was hard to . . . focus, or breath, or _not pass out_ \--

But I forced myself to pay attention to Token’s next words. “Yeah. He was drunk off his ass, just laying in an alleyway. We brought him back to your dorm room, and we found four empty vodka bottles under his bed, one that was half-full, and three more he hadn’t touched yet. And he had a flask on him that was empty.”

“So what?” Kenny’s sharp voice interrupted. “Craig loves vodka; where else is he supposed to put it when he’s not even allowed to drink in the first place?”

“Shut up, Kenny!” Clyde’s whining, angry voice yelled suddenly. I glanced over at him and saw him wipe tears from his eyes. “H-he said he drank it in a week! _All that shit_ in a fucking _week_!”

There was an uncomfortable quiet that swept the room, but I hardly noticed because of how hard my heart was beating.

Kenny broke it. “He could be . . . lying? For attention?”

Clyde growled angrily. “Shut the _fuck_ up, McCormick! You _know_ Craig doesn’t lie for attention! Craig doesn’t do _anything_ for attention; he hates it! You’ve known him since fucking preschool, how do you not know that by now?”

“I don’t think you know Craig as well as you think you do,” Kenny said darkly. “He’ll get over it.”

I was about to hit Kenny as hard as I could, and tell him that Craig had _never_ acted like that in the entire time I’d known him, so there was a pretty good chance that he _wouldn’t_ get over it, but, before I could, Clyde spoke again.

“No, _you_ don’t know Craig as well as _you_ think you do.”

Kenny shook his head. “Seriously, you guys should just ditch Craig while you have the chance. Let him wallow. He deserves it.”

“I can tell you now that that isn’t going to happen! I don’t care if Tweek’s his best friend now, but Craig will _always_ be my best friend, and if he’s in pain, I will kill everything that’s hurting him! What the _fuck_ did he do that was so bad?” Clyde said angrily.

“He called Tweek a . . . you know . . . F-A-G,” Kenny said bluntly. I was happy Kenny was doing all the talking, because I didn’t feel coherent enough to actually speak the right way, but I was a little miffed that he’d told them, because they were clearly going to be on Craig’s side of this, and I didn’t actually want them to know.

Token and Clyde exchanged looks, but neither of their concerned expressions fell.

“Okay, and?” Token asked, folding his arms over his chest.

Kenny sputtered, glancing at me out of the corner of his eye, obviously not expecting that reaction. I was a little surprised myself, because of all the responses that the two of them could’ve had to Kenny’s announcement, that one didn’t even cross my mind as a possibility.

“ _And_?” Kenny said, his surprise quickly turning into anger. “What the fuck do you mean _‘and'_?”

Token shook his head. “This is what Clyde meant when he said you don’t understand Craig. This is what Craig does. Something happened, and he got angry and hurt, and he shouted the first thing that came to his mind.”

“And the first thing that came to his mind was to call Tweek the f word?” Kenny asked bitterly.

“Yeah,” Token said, nodding. He was much calmer than Clyde, and wasn’t crying. “He didn’t mean it. He never does.”

“Do you guys _know_ how many times he told me that my mom dying was my fault?” Clyde asked, the tears coming faster. “I mean, only a couple times, but it’s such a horrible thing to tell someone! And people used to tell me that all the time, because people in South Park are the shittiest people in the entire world!”

“That’s not helping your case --” Kenny started, but Clyde just talked right over him.

“But Craig _never_ did it when he was just joking, like a shit ton of other people did. He did it when he was hurt and I was the only person around! And his intention wasn’t to hurt my feelings, he just got so angry and he... and he --”

“Lashed out,” Token said.

“Yeah, lashed out,” Clyde said, gesturing with his head to Token. “And do you know _why_ I know he didn’t actually mean it?”

I didn’t know what to say, and neither did Kenny, so neither of us said anything.

“Because one year after my mom died, when I was so sad that I wouldn’t talk to anybody for any reason, he came to my house after school, and gave me an armful of tacos and let me cry all over him! And I could tell that he didn’t want to, because he just patted my back awkwardly and kept saying, “there, there,” in this uncomfortable voice, but he did it anyway! When I finally let him go,” Clyde said, wiping at his eyes furiously, “he told me that if I needed him, he’d be there for me! _That’s_ how I know we were best friends, and _that’s_ how I know he cared about me! It might come as a shock to you, Tweek, that Craig would say that to you, because Craig has been nothing but nice to you since he met you, but I was his best friend for _years_ \-- since we were _three_ \-- and I can tell you that he didn’t fucking mean it!”

“That’s a bullshit excuse,” Kenny spat, his eyebrows narrowing angrily. “You don’t get to just say ‘welp, that’s just how he is’ when he does shit like this, and I don’t really care if you two are content following after him like a couple of bitches in heat, but I will _not_ let Tweek do that.”

Token turned to me, completely ignoring Kenny’s rant. “Tweek, listen to me, okay? I have never seen Craig care about someone as much as he cares about you. Whatever happened between you guys, just . . . put it aside, okay? Please? Because Clyde and I did our best to talk him down, but we’re just . . . we’re not you.”

“And he is fucking _broken_ right now,” Clyde said.

I felt part of me being swayed to their line of thinking, because it made sense, and Craig seemed like the person to do that, but I couldn’t figure out _why_ he was hurt in the first place? And he acted like _I_ hurt him, but I didn’t! I _didn’t_!

“Well, then -- NGH! -- what about Nikiel?” I asked, shrinking into myself as my brain flicked through about forty thousand thoughts at the same time.

“Who’s Nikiel?” Clyde asked, wiping absently at his eyes.

“He was our waiter once, and Kenny and I saw Craig walking with him, and they were going to Nikiel’s apartment!” I exclaimed, tugging as hard as I could on my hair at the memory. “GAH! _Why would he do that?!_ ”

Token and Clyde exchanged looks again.

“That’s probably where he got his vodka --” Token answered nonchalantly.

“But they were talking about Nikiel’s _dick_!” I shouted, my hands loosening their grip in my hair and turning into fists at my sides. I didn’t know if that was something I really wanted them to know about, but it was out in the open, (as a lot seemed to be at that point, mostly without anybody’s permission).

“Tweek, I’m pretty sure I know where you’re going with this, but I can guarantee you that’s not true,” Token said, shaking his head. “There must be a logical --”

“ _No_!” I shouted, standing up quickly and glaring at them. I had about _enough_ of them trying to defend Craig! Kenny was right -- if he wanted to go off and ruin his life, then whatever, it wasn’t my problem anymore, Craig made that abundantly clear! Because he _had_ to’ve meant it if it was even a thought of his, so . . . so _fuck_ him! “No, it’s _obvious_ what’s going on, but I don’t fucking care! He can do whatever the fuck he _wants_ , I don’t give a _fuck_!”

“Then you’re a real _shit_ friend,” Clyde spat, standing up, too. At first, I thought he was going to hit me, but instead he grabbed Token’s arm and tugged him to his feet, too. And then I thought they were _both_ going to hit me, but then Clyde muttered, “Come on, Token, let’s go.”

Token seemed to agree, because he leveled a disappointed look at me, shook his head, and they both left.

I stared at the doorway, their abrupt departure making me feel even fucking worse. I was closer to Kenny and Butters than I was to Token and Clyde, but that didn’t mean I wanted them to hate me! But they were on Craig’s side; they were his best friends since the beginning, there was no way they were going to abandon him, and especially not for me, a spaz that was fucking up his life, slowly but surely, till the point where it wasn’t even salvageable!

I let out a long, shaky breath in the attempt to calm myself down, (it didn’t work), and I collapsed back onto the creaky arm chair, squeezing my eyes shut as I asked miserably, “Ngh -- Am I a shit friend, Kenny?”

“No,” Kenny said immediately. “You’re not. Because you’re not his friend anymore, and he did that to himself.”

I nodded vacantly, but I wasn’t entirely convinced, because nothing about the situation felt right to me.

“You were right to stand up for yourself,” he said firmly, putting a hand to my shoulder and squeezing. “You don’t need someone like Craig in your life if he’s just going to treat you like that. I don’t give a flying fuck if he means it or not, and you shouldn’t either.”

I let out a long breath, and forced a smile.

Kenny always knew just what to say.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tweek's religion is officially Buddhism, and I have completely neglected that this entire story, so... here's Buddhist Tweek! Also, I am NOT a Buddhist, and I don't speak Sanskrit, so the chant took a bit of googling. (Sidenote: one of the reasons I love writing, I learn so much!) So I apologize if I got some of it wrong, I tried to make it as accurate as possible!
> 
> I hope you liked it! Tell me what you think!


	17. Baby, You Cried Last Night

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jeesum crow, the longer this story goes on the more pressure I feel to live up to the hype!!! So many nice people keep reviewing, I'm so happy, thank you!
> 
> I hope you enjoy, and please please PLEASE tell me what you think!!!
> 
> (Also stroooong language warning this time 'round, more so than usual.)

_Fucking Tweek_.

That was a thought that went through my mind every day since I met him. At first, though, it was more like, ‘how the fuck can one person make this much noise?’, and then it went on to be, ‘how the fuck can one person manage to get under my skin so much?’, to, ‘how the fuck did this spaz become my best friend?’ to, ‘I want to fuck this guy, but only in my dreams, because in my dreams it isn’t weird,’ to, ‘Okay, so maybe it wouldn’t be _so_ bad to fuck him in real life,’ to, ‘fuck, I think I’m gay, but like, a lot for this one specific person,’ to ‘I totally fucked up and now my Tweek hates me.’

And it was way worse than if he was _just_ my best friend. But literally the second I figured out that I was in fucking love with him, I managed to fuck it all up. But I was just so . . . jealous and angry and hurt and I didn’t know what else to do, other than get rid of him, because I had never dealt with jealousy very well in the past. I was really, really bad at dealing with jealousy, actually, because I didn’t normally care about things, so if I did care about something, and someone were to steal that something away, my stomach would boil and my heart would burn.

And never had I ever cared about something more than I cared about Tweek.

After Tweek left that night, I just kind of stared at the wall for probably a few hours, because I didn’t know what else to do. There wasn’t much else I _could_ do, really. Running after him was not an option, for two reasons: he seemed like he . . . needed space, and I didn’t know where he was going. He said he was going to Kenny’s apartment, but I didn’t know where that was, and Tweek seemed a little . . . out of it, anyway. Besides, I didn’t want to hear what else he had to say, because the shit he’d already told me was fucking with my brain more than I think he realized.

I didn’t hate him. I never hated him. I just wouldn’t have been able to handle watching him be in love with another guy. And I couldn’t handle the fact that he didn’t trust me. And I was mad that he kept acting like nothing was wrong, when something was clearly wrong, because he was fucking around with Kenny and didn’t tell me. And it’s not like I _owned_ him or anything, but I felt like maybe that was something you tell your best friend.

I told him when the Bitch told me to sleep with her friend. And nothing had even happened. I would’ve told him about Nikiel if Tweek wasn’t around for it. The only thing I could fathom keeping a secret from him, was the fact that I was in love with him. That was something I could condone not sharing, because telling him that seemed like it would do more harm than good.

But I didn’t even have to make that decision, because all of that . . . _shit_ happened. And it felt unreal.

I didn’t expect Tweek to come back that same night, because he didn’t even seem like he knew what he was doing when he left. His eyes were wild, even if his mouth and voice was firm, and his movements were too jerky to suggest he was in his right mind.

I don’t think I slept that night. My brain was tortuously replaying his words, and my words, and the complete hatred in his eyes as he glared at me. Even if I did manage to get to sleep, I would just have repeated nightmares of the same scene, but my heavy chest would probably invent new details that didn’t happen, like Tweek acknowledging my feelings and adamantly rejecting me, or Satan pulling me from my bed, laughing, and saying that I didn’t deserve to be happy, or everybody that I knew laughing at me and leaving me behind.

I hated being awake, but sleeping was worse.

And when the sun came up, and I was still sitting in the same position, staring at Tweek’s wall, I blinked a few times and turned my gaze to the window. The sun wasn’t it’s normal color yet, it had more reds and oranges, but it was enough to briefly draw attention away from the situation at hand.

I hated mornings. I hated the harsh colors of morning, the sound of birds happily tweeting away, the hustle and bustle of normal people, who had shit to do and were keen to get it done at a ‘reasonable’ time in the morning so that they could have the rest of the day to themselves. I hated all of that. I loved the night, the darker blues and blacks, the sounds of crickets, the light of the moon and stars. It was easier to hide then. Because I could stay awake for as long as I needed to, and everybody else would’ve been asleep for hours, and wouldn’t feel the need to bother me.

It was Thursday. I had history. And I didn’t want to go.

So I didn’t. I just laid on my side, because I didn’t realize how unbelievably sore my neck was until I moved it, and curled into a ball.

And then at some point, I fell asleep.

* * *

I woke up later that day, and I knew it was still day the second I opened my eyes, because the sun was being a little bitch. It was beating down on me, and I groaned, putting an arm to my eyes and squeezing them shut. I -- thankfully -- had dreamless sleep, and it was awesome. It was like I had just ceased to exist for awhile, and part of me wanted to go back to that empty space, because, even after I woke up, there were a few blessed seconds where I forgot fucking everything. I forgot that Tweek’s side of the room was going to be empty indefinitely, I forgot that the one person I cared about more than any other person who has ever existed throughout time hated me, I forgot that I had no idea how to move forward from that point.

But, the second I _did_ remember what the fuck was going on, I deflated, my chest caving into me as I plopped down on my back. And then I just laid there for, I don’t know, maybe five, ten minutes? before I resigned myself to the fact that just laying there doing nothing wasn’t going to help me anymore than sitting up and doing something would, so I pushed myself up and rubbed at my eyes, taking in my surroundings.

Everything looked the fucking same as always. The closet door was slightly opened, my backpack dropped carelessly at the foot of my bed, a stack of textbooks on my bedside table next to my closed laptop and my fully-charged-but-still-on-the-charger phone. In between my bedside table and Tweek’s bedside table, there was a fairly decent-sized desk facing the window, with a half empty box of granola bars, an almost empty jar of peanut butter, and four slices of bread inside the plastic bread bag. It was my turn to go grocery shopping. Behind the desk was a crooked wooden chair that was covered with obscene carvings, random doodles, and about a million “___ was here”’s. I had seen all that shit before, every fucking day, and I had always been remarkably impartial to it all.

I grew restless just staring at my room, so I stood up, pulling on the handles of my chullo and staring at my still-fully-clothed body. I briefly thought about changing my clothes if I was going to go grocery shopping, but I decided naw, fuck it, nobody was going to tell the difference. I fully intended to avoid everybody I knew as adamantly as possible, anyway, so even if I did see someone I knew, I would, for lack of a better description, run away. Because I had always been very light on my feet.

So I skipped the getting dressed part, and started pulling on my shoes, tying them with only half my heart in the effort, and stood up again when they were just a little too tight. I picked my coat up from the floor, slipped it on, zipped it up and dug my hands into the pockets to make sure the key was still in there. And I did grab hold of my dorm key, but I also grabbed hold of something else.

A small scrap piece of paper.

I yanked it out of my pocket, unfolded it, and read,

 

_NIKIEL_

_839-555-7177_

 

I growled, clenching the paper in my fist. Because the afternoon I had _met_ that asshole, he was waiting my table with Tweek and was what _caused_ Tweek to scamper off to fuck-knows-where with Kenny, thus ditching me _again_ after adamantly stating how excited he was to spend more time with me. _Nikiel_ was what caused that, it was _his_ fault, and that entire situation built up to the fight, and . . . fuck it, I remember thinking angrily as I tore the paper up in half three times, let’s blame the waiter! Better than nothing!

I let out a rough breath and threw the pieces into the trash can by my bed.

Blame the waiter.

Blame the _fucking_ waiter.

My sudden thrust into irritation put me off leaving my dorm room, so I shed my coat, kicked off my shoes, and trudged back over to my bed. I didn’t want to go back to sleep because, as much fun as dropping off into the void of non-existence was, I knew that dreamless sleep was a one-time thing for me. It wasn’t like I normally had weird dreams, but my brain was too full for my subconscious not to jump into action. I was seriously surprised that I had managed to achieve dreamless sleep to begin with.

I pulled the covers over my body, and reached for my laptop, lifting the lid and typing in my password. My wallpaper of Stripe #4 wearing his alien costume from when I was Super Craig popped up. The picture usually made me smile, but it didn’t that time. I pulled up YouTube, and clicked the first video on the Recommended section, which happened to be a video called “The Banach -- Tarski Paradox.”

It was . . . okay. Interesting. I started spacing out about halfway through.

The video itself was about twenty-four minutes long, and, pretty much the second it ended, I heard a ping from my phone. I figured it was probably from Clyde, because he was really the only person who ever texted me. But, when I reached for my phone and opened my messages, the name, instead of Clyde, said Kenny. And that didn’t bode well for me at all, because the text only had five words:

_Get fucked, you fucking cunt._

I tossed it away irritably, and burrowed deeper into my bed.

So Tweek _did_ make it to Kenny’s apartment.

Great.

* * *

I did actually end up going to class on Friday. I had biology, which was almost as horrible as history, as I’m sure I probably already mentioned at one point. I . . . somewhat paid attention? but I kept drifting off, my eyes straying to the one window of the room and glaring at the snow that was starting to fall. My professor was starting to explain the exam, how it would work, a generalization of what we should study, but I was only really half aware of what was happening.

And by the time class was dismissed, I started packing my shit away sluggishly. I didn’t hurry, I didn’t purposely wait to be the last person in the room, I didn’t care enough either way. But, before I could leave, my professor called out for me to wait.

“Mr. Tucker? Could I speak with you for a moment?”

I had to physically force myself not to flip him off, and I turned to face him. “I guess. What do you want?”

My professor gestured me to his desk, so I rolled my eyes and walked over, gripping the handles of my bookbag irritably. My professor observed me from behind his thick-rimmed glasses for so long that I got slightly uncomfortable, and, after about ten seconds of him just staring at me, he nodded and said,

“Mr. Tucker, I think you’re a special student --”

I grimaced and rolled my eyes again.

“And you have a lot of potential,” my professor continued, as if he didn’t see me completely wave him off. “I’ve noticed that you haven’t been trying your best these past couple weeks, and I wanted to give you an opportunity I haven’t given the other students.”

That interested me. So I raised an eyebrow as if to tell him to keep talking.

“You didn’t hear a word of what I said during class today, did you?”

I shrugged.

He sighed. “I’m going to give you an outline of what I talked about today. I noticed the other students taking notes, but you just sat there. I won’t ask why, but I want you to pass this class.”

When my professor called me over, I didn’t expect that. I don’t know what I expected, or if I expected anything at all, because the only thing I could really think about was how I was going to avoid my dorm room, while also avoiding everybody else I knew. “Why are you helping me if you think I don’t care?”

My professor started rustling through the papers on his desk, while he said, “Because. Even the best men lose their footing. Takes a recovered man to know a broken one.”

I didn’t like how he worded that, but I decided to ignore him, and said, “Well. Whatever. I can have your notes?” I don’t know if I really planned on using them, but I wasn’t too keen on failing, either, so I figured it was my best bet, considering I had no clue what to expect on the exam, and studying _everything_ we covered seemed unnecessarily daunting.

My professor smiled at me. “Only if you plan to utilize them to the best of your ability. Can you do that?”

I raised an eyebrow. “Can I totally take advantage of the fact that you think I’m ‘special’? Yes, I think I can do that.”

My professor brandished four pieces of paper, paperclipped together, single-spaced, double-sided, using only bullet points and numbered lines. I grimaced. That looked fucking horrible, and I wanted nothing to do with it, but I took it from him anyway.

“Here you are, Mr. Tucker. Don’t say your favorite professor never did anything for you.”

“I never said you were my favorite professor,” I said blankly, and part of me expected my professor to get angry with me for saying that, but he just kept smiling.

“I have a feeling I am now,” he said, organizing his papers and sliding them into various folders and binders he had stacked on his desk. “Have a nice day, Mr. Tucker.”

I gave him a weird look, but realized that I was now allowed to leave, so I turned away and said, “I guess.” And after I left the building, I, without thinking, started walking in the direction of my dorm room, because I couldn’t think of anywhere else to go. I headed the long way, though, so that I had time to figure out where the hell I was _actually_ going _before_ I made it to my dorm building.

It was cold outside, but it had stopped snowing. I put my chilled hands into my pocket and stared at the obnoxiously blue sky, that didn’t match the weather even a little bit. There was only one cloud. And it wasn’t shaped like anything recognizable. I was passing by a liquor store. _Main Street Liquor Outlet_ , it read over the door in cursive lettering, like it was something more sophisticated than a place to get booze and cigarettes. I wanted nothing more in that moment, than to be 21 so I could raid the vodka section, my favorite clear liquid, (or my favorite _any_ liquid, probably), but I only spared it a longing, passing glance, and kept walking.

I turned my attention back to the sky. It hadn’t changed.

And I had only been walking for maybe a minute? before I heard a voice call out, (even over the chatter of the fairly busy sidewalk),

“Hey! Little blue giant!”

Without even looking, I recognized that voice. I didn’t want _anything_ to do with that fucking voice, so I started walking faster away from it. Sure, there was a chance that there was somebody else around that was wearing mostly blue, and was really, really tall, but I didn’t want to risk it. Because if that person was talking to me, then any conversation between the two of us would be horrible and uncomfortable.

“I know you can hear me!”

I ignored the voice even harder than before. I had hoped the voice would take a fucking hint and fuck off, but apparently the body that the voice belonged to was extremely fucking fast, because a few seconds later, I heard footsteps that matched my speed perfectly. And the smooth voice, belonging to Nikiel, chuckled next to me, saying, “Hey, baby, you sure do walk fast.”

“Leave me alone,” I said blankly, purposefully keeping my gaze off of him. “And don’t call me that.”

He ignored that first part, and asked, falling into stride with me, “Okay, so what _should_ I call you?”

Without even thinking, I looked back up at the sky and said, “Craig.”

I felt his eyes on me, but I pointedly ignored him. “You look like a Craig.”

“Thanks.”

“Not sure I meant it as a compliment.”

“Okay, then fuck you I guess, what the fuck do you want from me?” My normally monotone voice took on a slight edge, but Nikiel didn’t seem to have noticed.

“A date,” he said, and, when I glanced over, he was flashing me a ‘charming’ smile.

“Absolutely fucking not.”

“Not even just one?”

“What the fuck does ‘absolutely fucking not’ mean to you?”

He laughed, attempting to bring his arm around me. I saw this coming a fucking mile away, and I shoved him harshly, watching in minor satisfaction as he almost fell off the sidewalk into the -- luckily for him -- deserted street. Nikiel righted himself quickly enough, but still started walking next to me again.

“Okay, so not cool, first of all, and second of all, you’re somehow even hotter today then you were a few days ago.”

I tried walked faster, but he just wouldn’t fucking leave me alone.

“We don’t have to call it a date,” he continued casually. “It can just be two friends, hanging out --”

“But we’re not friends.”

“Then acquaintances --”

“We will be nothing more than that. Ever.”

Nikiel chuckled again. I was putting him through the ringer, because he deserved to be put through the ringer for how obnoxious he was being, but all he was was amused. It just pissed me off more. “Not so fast, baby --”

“Don’t call me that --”

“There’s a nice restaurant just around the corner, they’ve got the best fajitas you will ever taste in your life --”

“I’m not hungry.”

“A movie then?”

“Not in the mood.”

“Bowling?”

“Do I look like the fucking type?”

“There’s a comedy club that’s . . . okay, it’s on the other side of town, but the comedians they get there are _hilarious_ , and I am extremely curious what you sound like when you laugh --”

“I don’t want to go anywhere, asshole,” I said blankly, keeping my eyes forward. It was kind of a lie, because I was going somewhere besides my dorm room, I just didn’t know where yet. All I knew was that Nikiel was not going to be apart of wherever I was going.

“Okay, we don’t have to _go_ anywhere,” he said, rolling his eyes. “We can just go back to my apartment --”

“No.”

“Go back to my apartment,” he repeated, with a smile on his face, “and watch a movie or something. Have a few drinks. I got all sorts of shit, drinking is a national pastime.” I narrowed my eyes at him, but kept my face forward. I didn’t want him to know that I was actually interested. I mean, alcohol? That I didn’t have to pay for? I was more intrigued than I’d care to admit. “I double as a bartender. I can make you any drink you want, any cocktail, screwdriver, margarita, you name it --”

“Wait,” I said, stopping in my tracks and glaring at him. “Did you say screwdriver?”

Nikiel stopped, too, and raised an eyebrow. He smiled like he thought he had me pinned down. “Yeah. You like screwdrivers?”

“Fuck no, too much fruit, but you have vodka?”

He chuckled, nodding. “I’ve got lots of vodka, it’s a favorite of mine. Not as good as whiskey, or tequila, but still good --”

I narrowed my eyes. “Shut up,” I mumbled, folding my arms over my chest. There was a crucial decision for me to make in that moment: I had virtually no other way, really, to get vodka while I was still at college, because the only person outside of the South Park guys that I’d made friends with was Tweek. I had no vodka, or weed guy; Travis was two-and-a-half hours away, and, even though he was a really nice guy, no way was he going to waste what little money he had on gas to get himself here. So Nikiel was a God-send, as far as I was concerned. And I could either waste away, sober, or I could tolerate Nikiel’s company for free booze.

“How far away is your apartment?” I asked, kind of angry with myself for saying the words, but not bringing myself even close enough to caring.

He smirked at me, nodding in the direction we were walking. “Not too far. Five minutes maybe?”

I grumbled, irritated, but followed him, staring straight ahead of me so I could briefly pretend like I wasn’t going to do what I was going to do. And I kind of hoped he would shut up so I wouldn’t have to listen to him talk while we walked there, but he almost immediately said,

“So, forewarning, my apartment really isn’t all that big, but it’s perfect for one person.”

I shot him a bored side-glance. “I really don’t care.”

He shrugged. “Hey, man, I’m just warning you. It’s small. There isn’t much room.”

“I seriously don’t give a _single_ fuck.”

“You’re lucky I’m just talking about my apartment! If I was talking about -- _something else_. . .” he leaned into me, but I leaned away, something that didn’t seem to bother him, because he just smirked, “it would be a _completely_ different story.”

“I don’t care about _that_ , either.”

He chuckled, straightening again, and saying, “You’re just playing hard to get, baby, you’ll come around --”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “I told you not to fucking call me that.”

Nikiel waved me off. “Right. Well, tell me a little about yourself, _Craig_ , since we’re going to be walking for a little bit. It’d be stupid not to take advantage of the opportunity. Besides, you seem like an interesting guy.”

“I’m not.”

There was a beat of silence, that I enjoyed very much, before he said, “I don’t believe that for a second. You look like the type of guy that would be into something really . . . predictable, like baseball, or wrestling, whatever. I mean, you’ve got a wicked black eye, so there’s gotta be something with you and fighting.” I didn’t react to his observation. “But you also look like the type of guy that’s into something completely off the charts like . . . I don’t know, beluga whales, or something.”

I blinked at him. “Beluga whales? I look like the type of person that’s into beluga whales?”

Nikiel didn’t really seem all that put off by my flat voice or blank stare. “Maybe not specifically beluga whales, but something that someone who first met you wouldn’t expect.”

I looked forward again, adjusting the strap of my bookbag. “I’m not into anything.”

“Okay, I’ll be the one to call bullshit --”

“I’m serious. I’m boring. Drop it.”

He chuckled, holding his hands up surrender and shaking his head. “I’ll get it out of you eventually, you know.”

I shook my head. Jesus, he was pulling on every single one of my nerves, and, for the past two days, all of my nerves had been heightened. Even the things that I had been originally indifferent to either made me surprisingly sad or irrationally angry.  

And Nikiel was one of those. As indifferent as I was to his existence earlier that week, everything he did pissed me off. And I couldn’t believe I was willing to put up with him, but . . . what are you going to do? Vodka is vodka.  

* * *

Nikiel’s apartment was on the first floor of his building. He led me down the hall, unlocked his door, and let me inside first. I took a few steps in and looked around lazily. It was warm in there, and, pretty much right as I was about to take my jacket off, Nikiel said,

“You can hang your coat up on that rack there,” and he walked past me inside, shutting the door behind him. I did, absently, and looked around the apartment to try to figure out more about the guy. I didn’t really trust him all that much, because he was apparently the type of guy to not take no for an answer. I’ve been told I’m supposed to avoid people like him, but I’ve also been told not to drink excessively, and I’d never been the type of person to do what other people told me to do.

But I didn’t have much time for figuring him out, though, because the second I turned around, I heard Nikiel say,

“Hey, Craig?”

The weird tone of his voice -- slower and deeper -- caught my attention, and I looked over to him, only to see him advancing towards me. And, before I could even process what the fuck was happening, my back was pressed up against the door, a pair of hands latched onto my waist, and a pair of cushiony lips were on mine. My eyes widened as I stared at his lidded, brown eyes, which were locked onto me to check my reaction.

I . . . didn’t really have one. Unless freezing up in surprise, shock, and disbelief counted. Nikiel kept his lips on mine for a few more seconds, before he pulled back. He studied me for a few seconds, before he said slowly, “You’ve never done this before. Have you?”

His voice shocked me back into reality, and I scowled, pushing him off of me. “Done fucking _what_ before?” I hissed, wiping dramatically at my mouth. “I’m here to get wasted on the vodka you _claimed_ to have.”

He looked me up and down, as if he hadn’t expected that. “Wait, so we’re not --”

I folded my arms over my chest. “If you’re asking if we’re about to _fuck_ , the answer is no.”

Nikiel paused, his gaze flicking between my eyes like he thought I was fucking lying. Finally, he said slowly, “You really just came here for booze?”

“I really did.”

Nikiel hesitated for a few seconds, a flicker of disappointment crossing his face before he shook it away. “Okay, so I totally misread this entire situation,” he said absently. Don’t know how he could’ve _possibly_ done that, I had made myself pretty clear _several_ times. He turned away and strolled in the direction of this fancy white cabinet that was pressed up against the wall. “Vodka, you said?”

“The strongest you have.”

He snorted. “I don’t think you can handle the strongest I have. You’re too small.”

I frowned. That was the first time in my entire life that I’d been called small. Mostly because I was so tall, people didn’t register the fact that I was a little on the skinnier side for someone my age. “I think I can figure that out for myself, asshole.”

“Alright, baby boy, it’s your funeral,” Nikiel said, shaking his head and rummaging through the cupboard.

I narrowed my eyes at him. “You have the worst hearing of anybody I’ve --”

“Man, I have more vodka than I remember,” he interrupted, pulling out a full bottle of that burning clear liquid. He turned around and shook his hand, silently telling me to take it, so I did.

I twisted the bottle around so I could check the label. Eighty proof. I turned my lips downwards. Not bad. Not the best, but I’d take it.

Holding the bottle reminded me of something, something that I probably should’ve been more concerned with, in the context of the situation. Nikiel was a bartender. Nikiel had this massive fucking liquor cabinet that I was actually really _impressed_ by. So that meant that . . . “Dude, how old are you?”

“I’m twenty-one,” Nikiel said, as he grabbed a second bottle, filled with golden liquid, and shut the cupboard door. I raised an eyebrow, but wasn’t all that bothered by his age, so I didn’t say anything, and set the bottle onto the coffee table, making myself comfortable on his couch.

Nikiel set his own bottle next to mine, and folded his arms over his chest. “Why, how old are you?”

“I’m eighteen.”

He chuckled. “No shit? You look pretty old for your age.” Before I could answer, he turned away in the direction of -- what I assumed to be -- the kitchen, and added, “I’ll be right back, going to grab some glasses.”

While Nikiel was gone, I took the time to study his living room. It was fairly bare -- the walls were a light grey color, with a few pictures hanging up with -- again, what I _assumed_ to be -- his family, all bright white smiles and carefully set-up shots. Shit like that always made me wonder how much convincing people needed to make themselves look so happy. Because it wasn’t possible to be that happy. Humans weren’t wired that way.

I averted my eyes. The couch I was sitting on had clearly been used, but was in fairly good shape. The floors were hardwood, and they were swept to perfection. He didn’t have any cups or dishes left out -- even though he lived alone, and didn’t technically have to cater to anyone else -- and there wasn’t dust on a single surface. Not the coffee table, not any of the shelves, or the picture frames, nothing. He kept everything extremely clean. Way cleaner than me, and I always thought I was fairly neat. He didn’t seem compulsive, he just seemed like he liked a clean house.

Nothing wrong with that. Until you had to actually do the cleaning.

Nikiel came back a moment later, holding two glasses in hand, one with three ice cubes at the bottom. “Here you go,” he said, handing me the empty one. “Help yourself.” He gestured to the bottle, and I didn’t hesitate to unscrew the top and pour myself a fairly generous helping.

He smiled, pouring himself some whiskey, and then reclined on his couch, swirling the gold liquid in his own cup and clearly enjoying the clacking sound of the ice on the glass. “Let’s get shitfaced.”

I didn’t have an answer to that, and his statement didn’t make me feel happy, so I didn’t smile. I just reclined back, too. I let my head fall back against the couch as I nursed the glass in my hand. I might not have felt happy, but I was hit with an almost incapacitating wave of nostalgia. It’d been awhile since I’d gotten drunk off of pure vodka with some guy that enabled me. Travis was a lot like Nikiel in a way. He liked having a drinking buddy, and he was nice and accommodating. The only difference was that Nikiel was much cleaner. And didn’t offer to sell me heroin every few minutes.

I only really let that bitter feeling absorb me for like a second, before I just shrugged and lifted my head again, sipping at the glass. I don’t know if you’ve ever had vodka before -- pure vodka, with no orange juice or whatever in it -- but it fucking _burns_ if you’re not used to it, and it’d been almost five months since I’d had it.

Nikiel snorted, and when I looked over at him, he was watching me with a smile. “You’re a pussy drinker, you know that?”

I frowned, and, holding eye contact, downed the entire glass in one go. It fucking _burned_ , and it made tears come to my eyes, but I ignored the sensation, blinked the tears away and stared at him blankly.

“Damn, baby, you really know how to get me going,” Nikiel said, smiling at me from behind his own glass. “That was --”

“Finish that sentence and I’ll kick your teeth in.”

Nikiel chuckled, taking another sip of his drink. With his mouth still placed on the rim, he winked at me and said, “Kinky.”

I rolled my eyes. Part of me thought I’d made a massive mistake, but, when I poured myself another glass of vodka and took another gulp, I realized that that possible mistake seriously couldn’t have been all that bad.

* * *

I blinked awake. I had no idea what time it was, because I hardly felt well rested at all, (there was a sharp pain behind my eyes), and the room was dark. It only took a few, disorienting seconds for me to remember where I was, but the heavy arm around my waist and the warm breath on my face told me immediately that I wasn’t in my dorm room and that I was not alone. I focused my eyes as quickly as I could and saw that I was face to face with Nikiel.

He was still sleeping, snoring softly, with drool coming out from the side of his mouth. I recoiled, pushing at his chest and saying firmly, voice still a little hoarse from having just woken up, “Okay, time to stop touching me now.”

Nikiel blinked a few times, his eyes hazy and bloodshot. “Mmm . . . Craig?”

“Yeah,” I said, sitting up and rubbing my eyes. Nikiel was shifting around some, and as soon as it hit me that we were sharing a bed, I immediately looked down at my body in panic, patting my chest to make sure I was actually wearing clothes.

I let out a sigh of relief. My regular old blue NASA t-shirt was still on. I remember at one point, while I was still drinking, I got really hot, and took my sweatshirt off, so . . . nothing weird there. I moved my legs around and then immediately felt ridiculous for freaking out, because I was still wearing my jeans. The only thing that seemed to be missing was my hat, but there were a million possibilities as to why it wasn’t on my head, and, given the situation, the chance that Nikiel had taken advantage of me was going down the more I thought about it. And then I looked over at Nikiel, and saw he was wearing the same grey t-shirt, and, even though I couldn’t see his legs because of the blanket, I figured it’d be dumb if he wasn’t wearing pants.

I kicked him to get him to move, because he was groaning and just laying there, and it was pissing me off. “Dude, get up.”

At that, Nikiel finally sat up slowly and he ran a tired hand down his face.

“If you and I ever hang out again, and we drunkenly end up in the same bed, don’t touch me,” I said, trying to sound intimidating, but I just didn’t really have the energy for that. Well, that and my voice was all raspy and shit and there was no way it came across as that.

He chuckled lowly, leveling a content, unapologetic look at me. “Sorry, baby, I get touchy when I’m sleeping.”

“Stop _calling_ me that,” I said. “Where’s my hat?”

Nikiel yawned, holding a fist over his mouth as he gestured to the bedside table. “There.”

I grabbed it immediately and put it on quickly, pulling it over my aching eyes and falling back on the pillow carefully, to avoid jarring my hangover-ridden head. “Why am I in your bed, anyway?” I grumbled irritably.

“Because I didn’t want to force you to sleep on my couch, and you stumbled in here on your own, anyway.”

That surprised me a little, but, then again, I had blacked out at some point that night, so, realistically, I could’ve done anything. “Okay. So why are you _with_ me in your bed?”

“Uh . . . because it’s _my_ bed?”

I sighed, but wasn’t bothered enough by this to get angry. “What time is it, anyway?”

There was a pause, filled with random grunts and sheet rustling, before Nikiel spoke. “It’s, uh . . . Fuck, man, it’s four in the afternoon.”

I wasn’t as bothered by that as I might’ve been. “So how come it’s so dark in here?”

“Curtains, man.”

“Oh.”

Another pause. “You hungry? I can make you some breakfast. Or, uh, lunch? Early dinner?”

I shook my head, groaning and resting an arm over my eyes when they started to sting. My stomach was shouting ‘no’ at me, and I couldn’t believe Nikiel’s wasn’t, too.

“Alright, well, let me go get you some water, then.” There was some more rustling, followed by some soft, barely audible footsteps on the hardwood floors. “But you’re eating something later,” he added, ducking out of his bedroom.

I closed my eyes and prayed to sleep again, but that didn’t really work out for me too good. Because, not only was my headache fucking pounding, but only about five minutes later, Nikiel popped back in the room again. “Hey, man, you want some coffee?”

As soon as the words left his mouth, my heart panged the word, _Tweek_. But I pushed it aside with a long sigh and shook my head again. “I hate coffee.”

“Are you sure? It might make you feel better.”

“I’ve been conditioned to vomit at the taste of coffee,” I told him, lifting myself up onto my elbows and staring at him. “But . . . I like the smell. Are you having some?”

“The smell?” He gave me a weird look.

“ _That_ might make me feel better,” I said awkwardly. “I’ve always liked the smell of it.” So that was kind of a lie, and Nikiel just kept looking at me, so long that I got a little uncomfortable, and I shrugged sheepishly. “I don’t have to stick my nose in your mug, I just want to . . . be around it.”

Nikiel’s face softened, which I didn’t understand, because . . . I mean, why? His confused eyes turned warm and his downturned lips turned into a soft smile. I stared at him, waiting for an explanation for his sudden facial change, but all he did was nod, and say, “Sure. Follow me to the kitchen.”

By the time I had stumbled out of the bed, my eyes half-lidded to avoid as much light as possible, Nikiel was already sitting at one end of the kitchen table, an empty plate front of him, but there was the distinct smell of toast in the air and I put a hand to my stomach, pleading for it to settle. But just above the plate, I saw a cup of coffee in Nikiel’s hands. The smell of that hit me as soon as I saw it, thankfully shadowing the smell of his breakfast. But it wasn’t the same as what I was used to. Tweek’s coffee smelled like coffee at it’s most coffee; pure, black, rich. Roasted liquid coffee beans. Nikiel’s smelled sweeter; he put cream and sugar in his, so it wasn’t that dark, dark brown, almost black color. It was a darker shade of tan.

Not the same, but. Close enough.

“How much of last night do you remember?” Nikiel said, watching me over his massive mug of coffee.

I shrugged, sitting across from him and accepting the glass of water he slid over to me. “Not a whole lot. I think I dropped off at like . . . two in the morning?”

Nikiel just watched me some more, thoughtfully. He was quiet long enough for me to get uncomfortable, but, before I had time to ask him what the fuck he thought he was looking at, he said, his voice low, “Baby, you were crying last night.”

I jolted looking at him with wide eyes, ignoring the sting that that caused. I didn’t even acknowledge the fact that he called me ‘baby’. I was more wrapped up in the fact that I fucking _cried_. I didn’t know I cried when I got drunk! That’s such a terrible thing to find out about yourself, that when you’re excessively inebriated, you lose so much control over you emotions that you just completely break down. Because Tucker’s _don’t_ cry; the last time I cried was when I was five, and Tricia was born. I thought my parents stopped loving me, because they paid absolutely no attention to me at all. And it wasn’t like I thrived on their attention or anything; most of the time, even when I was that young, I just kind of ignored them whenever they tried. (Which wasn’t very often, but still.)

If I cried, then that meant I _cried_. I wouldn’t just tear up and then stop, because if I was blackout drunk, like I knew I was the night before, I wouldn’t have been able to stop. If I was sad enough to cry, then . . . I was _going_ to cry.

I stared at him as he gave me a reassuring smile. “You don’t remember that?”

“Fuck no, I don’t remember that,” I said, my voice only partially biting. I was too stunned to really get angry at him. “I don’t cry.”

“Well, you did,” Nikiel said, sipping at his coffee. “You told me all sorts of shit, too. You told me about Tweek,” I winced, and looked down, but that didn’t stop him from continuing. “You told me _all_ about how much you love him, and how he’s the . . . Saturn to your Pluto, whatever that means. And that he hates you now because of . . . what you called him.”

I rubbed at my eyes. “Jesus. Fuck. Nobody _ever_ needs to know about any of that shit, I can’t believe I told you.”

“No, it’s good that you got it all out,” Nikiel said, his deep voice soothing to my head-ached ears. “You really seemed like you needed it.”

“I don’t _need_ anything,” I hissed, feeling my chest clamp down on my heart, like a solid metal wall. I was embarrassed and angry that I’d exposed myself like that, and I was _extremely_ angry with my past self for just blurting all that shit out, clearly without censoring any of it.

Nikiel rolled his eyes. “Relax, Craig. What do you think I’m going to do? I’m not going to laugh at you, or tell anyone about it.”

I let out a breath at that, and irritably drank some more water. It wasn’t that I thought he was going to do anything in particular, it was just the fact that he knew. Him knowing was enough to piss me off; him _seeing_ it was grounds for homicide. “What did _you_ do last night, then?”

“When you started sobbing your eyes out you mean?” he asked, and I winced again. He had to put it like _that_. “I hugged you. Told you it was going to be okay. Took your hat off so you wouldn’t get heat stroke.” He shrugged. “You didn’t really seem to mind.”

“Well . . . I do now,” I said, drinking at my water. “And did I do anything _else_ completely humiliating?”

“First of all, you shouldn’t be humiliated for crying, everybody does it,” Nikiel said casually. “Second of all, you really only started crying at about . . . I don’t know, four in the morning? The rest of the time you were all happy and laughing. You have a cute laugh, you know.”

“Shut up,” I mumbled, which only made him chuckle at me. I tried to glare at him and he took an innocent sip of his coffee.

“So what do you want to do? You’re not exactly in tip-top shape to make it back to your dorm room right now.”

I sighed at that. Because, as much as I wanted to deny it, he was right. My eyes were still throbbing, my head felt like a million pounds, and my stomach was in knots. There was no way I would have been able to make it back to my dorm room in one piece, so I shrugged. “I don’t really care.”

“You want to watch a movie?”

I raised an eyebrow. Staring at a bright screen didn’t really appeal to me. “Not really.”

“I can shut off the lights, and we can dim the screen so it doesn’t hurt your eyes. You can have the couch to lay on, because you’re ten feet tall, and I’ll grab the armchair. I’ve got an awesome movie collection, you can pick whatever you want.”

I quirked my lips and averted my eyes. It was more appealing that doing anything else he had to offer. At least if we watched a movie together, we wouldn’t have to talk to each other because, as weirdly nice as Nikiel was, I found it extremely difficult to relate to anything he said. “I . . . guess that doesn’t sound so bad.”

Nikiel smiled widely at me when I glanced back over at him. “Great. You head to the living room and lay down. I’ll make you some toast.”

I groaned, putting a hand to my stomach again. “Absolutely fucking not.”

“I said it earlier, baby boy, you gotta eat _some_ thing --”

I gave up telling him to stop calling me various forms of the word ‘baby’, because it didn’t seem like that was going to stop, no matter how many times I threatened his general well-being. I was more concerned with the fact that the bile in my stomach was beginning to churn again. “If you don’t want me to puke all over your kitchen table, you should probably stop talking about food.”

He held his arms up in surrender and shook his head. “Fine. You win. Again. But seriously, if you eat, you’ll feel better. At some point.”

I put my forehead in my palm, my arm propped up on the table, and frowned. “You know, believe it or not, but I have been drunk before. And I have been hungover before. I know how to deal with it.”

“Well, yeah, but I’m sensing that your strategy for ‘dealing with’ things it to completely ignore them,” Nikiel said, scratching his chair out, standing up, and stretching. I stared at him, very unsatisfied by his response, but I stood up, too, walking past him to his living room to try to find his movie collection.

As the kitchen/living room door closed behind me, I made my way over to his TV, where there was this basket to the side of it that I hadn’t noticed the night before, about two feet by two feet, filled to the brim with DVDs. I tilted my lips downwards, impressed. He had a shit ton of really good movies, from horror, to comedies, to sci fis, to even a few romantic comedies. I skipped right the _fuck_ over those.

I settled on one of my favorite movies, which I was pleasantly surprised to see he had. _2001: A Space Odyssey_ , the best Kubrick film, forget _The Shining_ , that shit’s over-rated and over-talked about. I set up his TV and the DVD player, and waited for Nikiel to return from the kitchen -- hopefully without food. And he did, a little less than a minute later, with two bottles of water in his hand and a plate of toast in the other.

I groaned, settling a glare at him, but he just rolled his eyes, and set all three items on the coffee table. “I told you, you’re eating. I’m not letting you out of my sight until that plate is empty.”

I frowned, folding my arms over my chest and making my way over to his couch, collapsing onto it on my side. I never really took to people trying to take care of me the way Nikiel was trying to take care of me. I didn’t like the feeling; it made me feel like a kid. And, as much as I didn’t really ever do it, I would’ve much preferred to be the one to take care of someone else. But I knew that if I kept arguing, he was just going to get even more irritating, so I huffed and said, “Fine. Whatever.”

“Alright then,” Nikiel’s smug voice said. “What are we watching?”

“ _2001: A Space Odyssey_ ,” I said absently, nuzzling myself into his surprisingly-comfortable couch. I could’ve fallen asleep on it, if I really wanted to. I didn’t.

“Into sci fi?” he asked casually, reclining back on his chair.

I grunted.

“I mean, this movie’s pretty good, but it’s got nothing on _Alien_ \--”

I felt personally wounded by the statement. “Shut up, Nikiel, you unappreciative fake film enthusiast.”

Nikiel chuckled, but didn’t say anything, thank fuck.

* * *

As soon as the movie credits started rolling, I looked over at him and asked, “Are you cool with me taking some vodka back to my dorm room with me?”

Nikiel shrugged absently, standing up to remove the DVD from the DVD player. “Sure, help yourself.”

I stared at him, and waited for him to look back before I said, “I am going to repeat back to you what you just said to me. You said, ‘help yourself.’ Do you deny it?”

Nikiel gave me a weird look. “No, I’m serious, go for it. I made it sound like I have a lot of friends over, but I was really just trying to impress you.” He snorted. “‘Cause that worked.”

I shrugged, ignoring that last part. “I want you to remember those words, because you might regret them.”

* * *

After two more movies, ( _Alien_ , upon Nikiel’s insistence, and _Pulp Fiction_ , as was a mutual decision), it was sufficiently late, I was feeling sufficiently better, and I was ready to be by myself again. So I stood up, stretched, and grabbed my sweatshirt from the back of the couch. “I’m going back to my dorm room now,” I announced blankly, slipping my sweatshirt on over my head and adjusting my chullo when it was knocked askew.

Nikiel looked up at me and raised an eyebrow. “It’s kind of late, are you sure?”

“I’m eighteen, I can walk back to my dorm room just fine,” I said flatly, staring at him blankly. “Can I take some vodka with me?”

“Sure, man, how much?” Nikiel asked, standing up from his couch and stretching.

“All of it.”

That seemed to have immediately caught Nikiel’s attention, because his arms dropped to his side and his face fell slack. “You want . . . _all_ of it? Do you know how much is in there?”

“Enough to last me to the end of the semester,” I said. “And then, when I head back home, I can text my vodka and weed guy and he can hook me up with some more.”

There was a beat of silence, in which Nikiel stared at me incredulously and I stared back, with a much less interested stare.

“Baby, if you drink all of that at one time, you _will_ die, you know that, right?”

I shrugged. “Then I won’t drink all of it at one time.” Nikiel was still very hesitant, so I added, “You said you don’t drink much. It’s just going to be sitting in there. I can pay you, if you want.”

Nikiel shook his head, running a hand down his face. “I don’t want your money, Craig.”

I expected that. “Then it shouldn’t be a problem, right?”

He let out a long sigh, his eyes squeezed shut while I figured he was thinking. His eyes opened again, and he stared at me, his brown eyes somehow quirked downwards. “But you won’t be able to carry it all,” he said, as if that was just some random excuse he had thought of in placement of a standard ‘no’.

It was a good point, though. There were probably a good seven full bottles of vodka in there, and, while my bookbag was plenty big and supported the two textbooks already in there, it would’ve have been able to stand an entire bar.

“Okay, then I’ll bring as much as I can carry. And then I’ll come back some other time for the rest.”

Nikiel rolled his eyes. “Are you sure you don’t just need, I don’t know, therapy?”

I raised an eyebrow, but didn’t say anything.

“You’re drinking your feelings, Craig, are you not seeing that?” Nikiel said, his voice the closest to anger as I’d heard it so far.

“I wouldn’t say I’m drinking my feelings --”

“Well, _I_ would --”

“I did this all through high school,” I said, tugging on one of the handles of my chullo. “And I turned out fine. I had a few months where I didn’t drink, but now I’m going to start drinking again. And if I don’t get it here, I’ll get it somewhere else.”

Nikiel still looked extremely reluctant, but he nodded slowly and said, “Okay, fine. You can have . . . you can have _one_ bottle, but --”

“Two.”

Nikiel looked at me, surprised at my interruption. “What?”

“Two bottles. To start.”

He immediately shook his head. “No. One.”

“I’m repeating back to you what you said earlier: ‘sure, help yourself.’ ‘It’s all yours.’ I told you to remember those words, because I was going to use them against you. But if you don’t want to give me any, I can find some other, probably shadier place to get it.” So that last part was a total lie, because I really had nowhere else to get it, (I didn’t have the right connections), but I figured it was a good enough lie to guilt him into giving me at least some of it.

Nikiel looked extremely conflicted, his eyes moving from me, to the cabinet, to the floor, and back again. “But . . . what other place could you possibly find it, without it being really expensive?”

He wasn’t really helping his case. Like, at all. He was actually siding with me, whether he realized it or not. But I tried to keep my response as vague as possible to conjure horrible scenarios in his head.

“I’ll figure it out.”

Nikiel let out a long breath, pinching the bridge of his nose and putting a hand to his hip. “Jesus,” he mumbled, his voice filled with the impending decision he had to make. I did feel bad about what I was doing to him. I don’t mean to make it sound like I didn’t. But . . . I wasn’t quite right in the head at the time, and my priorities were a little askew, and my morals definitely out of whack.

“Okay,” he breathed finally, meeting my eyes. He looked more tired in that moment than he did when we had woken up that . . . afternoon. “You can have two. But . . . just two, okay? As a favor to me, just start with two, and . . . and _maybe_ I’ll give you more.” He was speaking so slowly, as if he thought that talking any faster would give him room to say something he would regret. “Do you still have my number?”

I remembered angrily tearing it up and throwing it in the trash the morning after Tweek had left. So, with a resounding voice, I said, “No. Lost it.”

Nikiel looked like he didn’t believe me, but he sighed, shook his head, and turned away to his kitchen. “Stay here for a second. Don’t run off. I’m going to give you my number again, and don’t . . . don’t lose it this time, okay?” His voice was so different than it had been when he had first given me his number. The first time I’d met him, he was so flirty and carefree, and, to be honest, he sounded like someone the other guys would probably enjoy hanging out with. But now he just sounded exhausted and it made me feel even worse. But just the thought of forgetting everything with the help of my old friend was . . .

I was willing to do almost anything.

When Nikiel came back, he had a sticky note in his hand, with that familiar neat handwriting and he handed it to me. I put it in my pocket purposefully, so that he saw I wasn’t going to lose it. It was the least I could do for him; out of everybody I’d ever met, he was the nicest to me, (besides maybe Tweek), and I was being absolutely horrible to him.

Just like I had been to Tweek.

Maybe that was just . . . who I was. Maybe I was just a terrible person and it just . . . it wasn’t going to change, I was going to die with the knowledge that I’d manipulated and hurt every person who ever treated me like a human being with actual feelings.

It was a thought that terrified me into not caring. If that makes any sense.

I was aroused from my thoughts when Nikiel put a hand to my arm and squeezed. “Craig, just . . . please be careful.” When I looked at him, his face was marred with worry. It didn’t fit his face, I didn’t want him to be worried about me. It didn’t feel right. “I don’t want you getting hurt.”

I stared at him blankly, but didn’t shake him off. I didn’t have the heart to do that. “I won’t.”

He let out a huff of breath. “That doesn’t make feel better at all.”

“Pretend it does,” I said, taking a step back. I walked around him and grabbed two bottles of vodka and slipped them into my bookbag carefully. If I broke the bottles on the way back, I would’ve been so pissed. I turned back to face him, and saw a deep frown staring back at me. I sighed. “I’m sorry, Nikiel.”

He shook his head. “I don’t want you to be sorry. I want you to be okay.”

“I will be. I always am in the end.”

“Right,” Nikiel said, his voice defeated and sad. “When you get back to your dorm room, text me, okay? So I know you got back safely. And don’t drink outside of your dorm room. And drink water so you don’t get too bad a hangover. And don’t forget to eat --”

“Relax, Nikiel,” I said, walking around him to his front door. I took my bookbag off briefly so I could put my coat on, and I added, “I told you, I’ll be fine. Everything’s okay, okay?”

I didn’t wait for an answer as I opened the door, and left.

* * *

I unlocked my dorm room, and, like every time I returned to it, my chest surged with hope that Tweek would be in there waiting for me, but, like every time I returned to it, my chest collapsed and I deflated as I trudged over to my side of the room. I plopped my bookbag carefully onto my bed, sliding the two bottles out and resting them on the bedside table. I tried not to look in the direction of Tweek’s bed, because nothing got me faster than any direct reminders of Tweek. To distract myself, I turned my phone on for the first time since the morning I got that lovely text from Kenny, so I could send a text to Nikiel.

I typed his number into my contacts, wrote ‘Nikiel’ as his name, and shot him a quick text that just said,

_Craig. Back._

before tossing it back onto my bed. After only a few seconds, my phone started pinging rapidly and I jumped, leaning over my phone to see what the fuck was happening. And there were about a million text messages from fucking Clyde, a couple from Token, and one from my mom.

I ignored the one from Mom. It was a text asking how my semester was going, and telling me that her, Dad, and Tricia were going to be pick me up the day after the last day of final exams.

I read through Token’s texts but didn’t answer any of them. They were basically saying that Clyde was freaking out, it was pissing him off, and that I should just suck it up and answer him because Clyde’s freak-out was probably only going to get worse if I didn’t.

I . . . begrudgingly read through Clyde’s massive mound of text messages. I scrolled to the top, (it started the same day I went to Nikiel’s apartment), and progressively reached the bottom.

_Dude craig guess wat_

And then another one ten minutes later,

_Craig dude guess wat_

And then another one from the same minute,

_U kinda hav to answr 4 me to tel you_

I grimaced at how improper he texted. I hated that. There was no reason for it. But the texts didn’t stop there, no they fucking did not.

_Craig_

_Craaaaaaaiiiig_

_Srsly dude answer ur phone its important_

_Ok i get ur all into prsonal space and shit but u usally txt back faster than this_

_Alrite i’ll tell you, since you don’t seem to fucking care_

_I scored a d8t with Bebe, she sed i wore her down after asking 4 milion times_

There was about a ten minute break in between texts, followed by:

_Isn’t that cool, Craig?_

_Craig?_

_Do i hav to cum over to ur dorm room or smthing bcuz this is actually like super exciting and it kind sux that you’re not excited for me_

The next text wasn’t until an hour later.

_Token told me not to go ovr there_

_Said i was ‘overreaciting’_

_asshole_

_so its like 6 and i havnt seen u at all like anywhere?_

_Did u die?_

There was another hour break.

_Token told me u probly didnt die_

_Ok dude ur starting to freak me out_

_Can u pls ansr ur phone_

_APPEASE ME_

_K ill leave u alone token sed ur probly having a red racer thing or something so ill give u till tomorrow to answer_

_And if u dont im calling the cops and reporting u missing_

And then the next message wasn’t until noon today, when I was still sleeping at Nikiel’s place. And it was even more panicked then the other ones. I rolled my eyes again.

_OKAY CRAIG EVN TOKEN SAYS THIS IS WEIRD ANSWER UR DAM PHONE_

_Srry i had to yell im worried_

_K im actally going over there now tokens coming with me_

_U better be there, tucker_

A twenty minute break.

_K so we’ve been knocking for a couple mintes and ur not ansring r u sleeping_

_Were txting the other guys but nobodys seen u_

_Kenny wont even answer us and we dont have tweeks number_

_Do u WANT me to get the cops invlved bcuz i fuckin will dont fucking test me_

An hour break.

_Well give you anothr day_

_Cartman told us were being pussies and ur like 18 or somthing so ull probly be fine_

_Right?_

And that was the last text from him. And thank fuck I always kept my read off, because if Clyde saw that I had seen all that shit, he would’ve started texting me again. I turned my phone off, without waiting for Nikiel to answer me, (if he was even going to), and I sat heavily down on my bed, taking in my surroundings.

It was . . . almost exactly the same as I had left it. Only some of Tweek’s shit was missing. Like all of his textbooks, and some of his clothes, and the duffle bag that he kept at the foot of his bed. His favorite lime green coffee mug. And his pillow wasn’t where it usually was, and that was probably the worst of all, because under his pillow was where Tweek kept his notebook.

He was moving out. Come next semester, he was going to be out of my life entirely. And he waited until I wasn’t in my dorm room to get all his shit, and there was something about that that made me feel even worse.

I sighed, and pulled out one of the vodka bottles, unscrewing the top and holding my lips to the rim.

“Fuck,” I mumbled, tilting my head back, and letting the burning liquid race down my throat.

* * *

Sunday came too fast. Or, at least I think it did, but I don’t really remember much after I had gotten back from Nikiel’s. Not because I was drunk, but just because everything around me was already in a blur to begin with. And it felt like a dream when I heard rapid knocking at my door.

“Craig, open the fuck up, it’s Clyde!”

I started blankly at the door, taking a short gulp from the bottle and keeping myself as quiet as possible so he wouldn’t know I was there.

“Craig, I know you’re in there!”

I refused to answer, despite the fact that there was more insistent knocking.

“Seriously, dude, open the door, you’re freaking me out --”

“Craig, it’s Token,” another voice chimed in. “You’re freaking Clyde out, and he’s getting really annoying to deal with, just open the door.”

“I’m just going to keep knocking until you answer,” Clyde threatened, and I knew that he was most definitely not bluffing, but I figured that he’d eventually get tired, or Token would drag him away, so I let it happen.

But only, like thirty seconds later, a third voice that I didn’t recognize, said, “Dude, he’s not in there.”

“Who the fuck are you?” Clyde spat out.

“I’m the dorm room next door,” the voice said. “I haven’t seen anyone go in, or come out of there in days.” I had no idea who that guy was, but I was thanking God that he existed to draw them away.

But it seemed like Clyde was going to need some more convincing, because he answered, his voice biting, “Well, you’re wrong, then.” And then I heard more knocking at the door.

“Clyde, maybe we should come back later,” Token said, his voice low, defeated, disappointed. I tried not to feel too guilty about it.

Clyde let out a very audible sigh. “Okay. Fine. But I'm not extending this waiting for Craig to talk to us deadline _anymore_.” And then I heard footsteps walking away from the door, and I let out a sigh of relief, taking another drink from the bottle before setting it aside.

* * *

A few hours later, after Token and Clyde were long gone, I heard my phone ping on the side of me. I closed my eyes and, for just a second, let myself hope that maybe it was Tweek, but I knew that it was definitely Clyde. When I opened my eyes again and glanced at the illuminated screen, I saw Clyde’s name. I clumsily held my finger over the sensor, went to my messages so I could read the message in it’s entirety.

_hey man i stopped by your dormroom today_

_again_

I sighed, and tossed my phone aside. Clyde didn’t sound as panicked as he did the first time he’d started texting me. I grabbed my flask and took a quick swig of it. The burn was still there, but it was starting to dull. Whether or not that was a good thing is up to reader’s interpretation, but the lack of pain didn’t make me slow down, if anything, it made me chase that sting that had drawn me to vodka in the first place.

There was another ping noise, and I looked down again, and saw that it was -- again -- from Clyde.

_knocked for like five minutes_

And then not three seconds later, I got another message.

_where were you_

I didn’t want to deal with him, so I turned my phone off and tossed it aside again. It wasn’t like I was _purposefully_ avoiding them because I wanted to be a spiteful bitch, I just didn’t want company, and the longer I was away from them, the more I realized that when I did eventually see them again, they were going to get increasingly more obnoxious. And there was a pretty huge chance that Clyde was going to cry.

I poured the rest of the vodka from my flask in my mouth and swallowed it bitterly.

I hated crying.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To clear things up: I knew it kinda sounds suspicious, but Nikiel did NOT take advantage of Craig. 
> 
> And, so I might've mentioned it before, but I currently go a community college, so I don't know 100% what normal, campus colleges are like, but I have had a teacher like Craig's biology teacher. I mean, under different circumstances, but we were pretty chill, so I know that a weird friendship between student/teacher like that isn't totally crazy. 
> 
> Also, I'm gonna direct whoever cares to the YouTube channel Vsauce, which is just amazing. That's where the "The Banach-Tarski Paradox" video comes from, it's sooo interesting. Science is cool. Well, the cool science is, anyway. 
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s86-Z-CbaHA&t=9s << this is the link to the video


	18. Tuckers Mate For Life

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, this is coming up later than I expected, but there were a few holes to fill in. Anyway, hope you enjoy!

I had since decided that I should start avoiding my dorm room at all costs during the day. It just made me feel worse to hear my friends get all panicky over me like they already had, and, as much as I wanted to see Tweek again, if he suddenly stumbled into the room when I was totally drunk off my ass, then I would’ve been so fucking pissed off, because that was not how I wanted him to see me. So I found various places around the town that I could hide myself from prying eyes until it was reasonably not-daytime anymore. (Usually after four o’clock.) Sometimes I would find a comfortable alley, with maybe a reasonably clean dumpster to sit on, or I’d hang out at the library in the biography section, and I’d even stooped so low as to hang out in the appliance section at Walmart. Really, I just went wherever I could easily slip away, or hide behind something if I needed to, which worked nicely, actually, because I managed to avoid, not only Token and Clyde, but also every other person from South Park that was in town.

A couple of times, I’d hole up with Nikiel, but only if I was sober. If I showed up drunk, or with even the slightest bit of alcohol in me, I knew he would cut me off completely -- even in the face of my threat to stoop lower for a crappier product -- and I wasn’t willing to let that happen. But I had only went to him when I was running low on the truth juice and needed a refill. I don’t know if he realized how much fucking vodka he was giving me, because he just kept fucking giving it to me.

And those visits would always start the same. I would text him,

_You home?_

and he would say,

_Work till_

Insert whenever he was scheduled to work, or he would say,

 _Yeah, just got off work_ ,

But either way, he would let me come over to hang out for a little bit. I felt really fucking bad for that guy. I was sucking the life out of him, I could see it every time I went over there. He would try to smile, but he looked so damn worried all the fucking time. And guilty. And before he would give me the bottles, he would always -- _always_ \-- say,

“Are you _sure_ you need this? Because I can help you, I can’t fucking watch you . . .” and then he’d gesture to me like I was some sort of psych ward patient, and add, “ _Drink_ yourself to death. This isn’t the way to deal with this.”

I’d always tell him no. And then he’d say,

“Please, Craig.”

And I’d tell him no again. And then he would let out this shaky sigh, hand over the bottles, and tell me to please be careful. I would tell him to stop worrying, I’d pat him on the shoulder, say thank you, apologize, and then leave. It very quickly became routine, despite the fact that it was only a week that that went on, and it had only happened a few times. Nikiel knew it, too, because he acted so defeated when he would go through the motions, like he was getting used to being tossed aside in the way I was tossing him aside. It was obviously more than just motions for him, though. He said and did the same thing every time, sure, but the sincerity behind it all was overwhelming.

He was a good guy. He didn’t deserve my shit. But he was easy to manipulate; he was so empathetic, and he wanted to help so much, that he was going about it all wrong. Maybe he realized that, maybe he didn’t, but all I knew was that I was still getting my vodka, and he seemed . . . willing enough, so I didn’t feel the need to question it.

But he would never let me drink in his apartment. That was a new rule he had instilled the first visit after my initial visit. I was never entirely sure why he felt the need to lay down that rule; it was possible that he just didn’t want to see me fucked up again, maybe he thought that if he separated himself from the problem, he wouldn’t feel as guilty, I don’t know. I followed that rule, though, to the t. I didn’t want to upset him, not anymore than I already had. So when I was there, I would drink all the water he would give me -- he was weirdly obsessed with staying hydrated -- and I would watch whatever movie we had ‘mutually’ decided on, (usually he gave me a few options, and I picked the on that didn’t sound like it would bore me to tears). I had asked him to make some coffee the first time I went over there, and he still seemed a little weirded out by the request, but he would smile sadly and nod and do it anyway, and, the second and third time I visited him, he already had a cup of coffee on the coffee table, prepared fully, with the scent wafting around the room pleasantly.

It was still too sweet, though. Too much sugar, too much cream. It made the coffee the wrong color, but, like I said before, it was better than nothing.

And when I went to leave, I would tuck the bottles of vodka into my bookbag and keep my head low.

* * *

Aside from avoiding my dorm room during the day, I had also taken to keeping my phone off, only turning it on to make plans with Nikiel, or to send brief, one-worded texts to tell Clyde that I was still alive, but not giving him any hints as to what happened, where I was, or what I was doing. It was usually just things like, _fine_ , or _alive_ , or _stop_. (The last being when he got particularly obnoxious with his piling up of one-sentence texts.) Something to tell him that I hadn’t wound up upside down in a ditch somewhere.

And that seemed to be working just fine, for the most part, but then, the Thursday after the fight with Tweek, I turned my phone on to find a voicemail from Clyde. I felt compelled to ignore it’s existence, but I clicked the play button anyway, because I was drunk and curious, and I was immediately met with Clyde’s rushed, worried words.

“ _Craig, dude, I haven’t seen you in like a week, and you’re apparently not in your dorm room,_ ever _, and you’re barely answering your phone, and just . . . what the hell, dude? What happened? Is everything okay? Token keeps telling me not to worry, but I can tell he’s worried, and I’m worried, too, goddammit!_ ”

There was a pause, but I could hear heavy breathing from the other end, and I gnawed on my bottom lip as I waited for him to continue.

“ _We finally found Tweek. He’s at Kenny’s. But Kenny won’t let us in_.”

My guilt churned my stomach as soon as I heard Tweek’s name, and I grabbed at the bottle on my bedside table, clumsily gripping the neck of it.

“ _Everybody’s being so . . . weird . . . Kenny won’t talk to any of us, and Stan doesn’t know what the fuck is going on, because he’s been chasing after his bitch, because she still won’t put out, and Kyle and Cartman are too busy doing . . . whatever the fuck they do, and Token and I are just . . ._ ” He sighed roughly, and there was another long beat of silence. _“Just call me back, okay? Or text me, or find me, or whatever, just . . . stop being an asshole_.”

And then the line went dead.

I let out a weird, breathy sigh, fumbling with my phone awkwardly to finally answer the many, many texts I had gotten from Clyde, as well as the messy voicemail, and, even though it took a little longer than it normally would have, I did manage to type,

_fine_

before blackening my phone and tossing it down my bed.

I got an answer immediately, but I ignored it. I unscrewed the bottle, and poured some vodka down my throat, and then turned to the empty flask on my lap. I had had that thing all the back in high school, when I stole it from a convenience store down the road from my house. I used to bring it to school with me every once in awhile, when life sucked more than normal. It was a bronze-looking color, but the color was fading, so it was obviously just paint, and it had a small sun design on one side, with a moon design on the other, both with these creepy, smiling human faces. I found it at the bottom of my backpack, the inside still holding the faint strong scent of Travis-provided high school vodka.

As carefully as my drunk fingers could, I poured some vodka into the small opening of the flask. I spilled a little bit of it, but I lapped it up as it dripped down the back of my hand.

I screwed everything tight, put everything down on the bedside table, and rolled onto my side. I pulled my hat down over my aching eyes, and silently prayed for sleep. And to forget. Not like that was going to happen. Even when I did sleep, almost every time I would have dreams about him. About the night he screamed at me, about all those random hugs he would give me, of all the possible fucks we could’ve had if he actually loved me back.

All those dreams just made morning drinking come more easily.

* * *

I heard a loud ringing noise, and I jumped, my eyes blurry and my head light. I picked my phone up from my bedside table clumsily, and my eyes widened at the time.

“O-oh, fuck, I -- I have class now!”

I tried to hurry to my feet, but I stumbled and almost smacked my head on the floor. I righted myself, kind of, and whipped my head around the room, trying to figure out what I was supposed to grab before I -- tried to -- run out the door.

“Textbook,” I mumbled under my breath. “Uh . . . what class do I have?” I went through my schedule in my head, and shuffled clumsily through the stack of books on the floor by my bedside table. “Science something . . . something with . . . gotta get to the science building . . .”

I figured that that was probably where I was supposed to go, so I pulled on my coat, slipped my flask into my coat pocket, grabbed one of my science textbooks -- hoping it was for the right class -- and hurried from my room. I tried to go faster than normal, but I was stumbling and almost falling over as I stomped my way down the stairs, and I was not fucking prepared for the blast of cold air that hit me when I finally reached the front door.

Class had already started, so the sidewalks were -- for the most part -- empty, except for a few non-college students, and a couple other students that were late, like me. As I neared the science building, I started to slow down, because the complete lack of sleep from the night before, paired with the itching compulsion to reach into my pocket and sip more at my vodka caught up with me.

I grumbled, shakily grabbing the flask and unscrewing the top. “Fuuuuck,” I mumbled, tipping my head back and taking two large gulps. It didn’t help my balance any, or my mentality, or my desire to _not_ sit in a classroom drunk for just over an hour, but other than that, it felt good.

When the two science buildings were clearly in sight, my eyes settled on the alley in between, where I saved my Tweek from having all his bones broken, and the same place where I realized that I loved that fucking asshole to begin with. It was a terrible alley, but I couldn’t look away from it, and my steps were starting to get clumsier, and my brain was swimming, and, instead of making it to the front door of either building, I just fumbled into the wet and snowy alleyway, and collapsed.

* * *

“--aig? _Craig_?”

I blinked a few times behind my eyelids, turning my head away from the intruding light.

“Craig, man, get up!”

I groaned, trying to twist away from whoever was poking and prodding me to get me to sit up.

“Fuck, Craig, it’s Clyde! Remember? _Clyde_?”

I groaned again, bringing a hand to cover my eyes. “Get that fucking light out of my eyes.”

“I fucking _can’t_ , that’s the fucking _sun_!” Clyde pretty much shouted right in my ear. I grimaced, and tried to pull away from him.

“Clyde, ease up,” a deeper voice said, and I felt part of me calm down just a little bit. Token. Token was reasonable. His voice wasn’t as high-pitched and obnoxious as Clyde’s was. “Let’s get him back to his dorm room.”

“ _Whooooa_ ,” I said, trying lazily to pull myself out of their grip when I felt myself being hauled to my feet. “It’s daytime.”

“Yeah, Craig, that’s generally when the sun comes out --”

“No, I-I mean . . . I can’t go _back_ , it’s daytime.”

Neither of them answered me, though, they just grabbed each of my arms, and wrapped them around their necks, so that they were weird human crutches. I was exhausted, my body numb and tingling, and I couldn’t have fought back even if I tried. Which I didn’t, because my brain was vibrating distantly, and my eyes were stinging, like someone was stabbing them with a fork from behind.

“Jesus, fuck, what time is it?” I mumbled, letting my eyes close to try to lessen the effects of solar radiation on my retinas.

“Afternoon classes just got out,” Token said from my right. His voice was hardly strained at all; he was talking like nothing out of the ordinary was happening. “It’s a little after 3:30.”

“Wait, did I . . . _go_ to class?”

“Probably not,” Clyde said, his voice terse and sandpaper-y. “Do you even know where you are?”

“Mm in Nebraska,” I mumbled, trying to focus on not tripping over my feet. “At college.”

“No shit, I mean where you _are_? We just found you in a fucking _alley_ , dude, did you not --”

“Clyde,” Token said firmly. “We’ll talk about it later.”

Neither of them spoke after that. Not until we got to my dorm building, which I only knew about because the air got warmer, and Token said, “Alright, we’re going to be going up some stairs now.”

Yeah, _that_ was fucking fun. Trying to hobble up three flights of stairs with my arms around two people -- one being a total moron that couldn’t keep his balance -- while also being totally shitfaced. We had to take a break after every flight, because it was just too fucking hard to go non-stop while being inside a body that was ready to quit after every step.

We stopped walking in front of room 374, when Token turned to me and asked, “Where’s your key?”

I furrowed my eyebrows, bringing my arms back to my sides as I buried my hands into my pockets. “Uh . . . should have ‘em.”

Clyde made an irritated sound, but Token and I ignored him. It took a few seconds -- because I knew I had them, I never took my key out of my pocket except for when I was actively using it -- but I finally grabbed hold of the cold metal in my coat pocket and handed it to Token. I knew that I wasn’t going to be able to unlock my door successfully, and I didn’t want to humiliate myself further by trying. “Here.”

As soon as the door was open, Token and Clyde grabbed hold of my elbows and guided me to my bed, Token pushing me into a sitting position.

“We’ve gotta get you out of these clothes,” Token said calmly, starting to unzip my coat. I swatted at his hand and immediately started to protest because fucking _no_ , but he said, “Craig, you were laying in snow, your jeans are soaked. You’re going to get sick.”

I cracked a burry eye open at him. “Seriously?” I asked, but I guess my body had already decided to just let Token undress me, because my hands fell lifeless at my sides.

“Yeah, seriously,” Token said, his eyes focusing on unzipping my coat and pulling it off of my body. I had to move my arms awkwardly to get the sleeves off, and it took way longer than it normally would have to get it off, but we got there eventually, and my coat made a wet scrunching noise when it hit the floor. Token then moved onto my sweatshirt, with wasn’t so much damp as it was super freezing; we did the same thing with my sweatshirt that we did with my coat, until I was down to one of my million blue NASA shirts, and my still-damp jeans.

Clyde pulled me to my feet and said, “You gotta do this part for yourself, dude,” in a stiff voice.

I groaned, but the thought of being in a warm pair of sweatpants was very enticing, so I fumbled with the fly of my jeans, (my fingers tangling when I tried to get the button undone),  and yanked down quickly.

“Whoa, dude, _just_ your jeans,” Clyde exclaimed, shielding his eyes from me entirely. I looked down and saw that I had pulled down not just my pants, but also my boxers. I didn’t scramble to cover myself, (if I did, I would’ve just lost my balance and fallen over, which would’ve added _more_ embarrassment to the embarrassment I was already feeling), but when I was all . . . hidden, I sat down on my bed, and shimmied out of my my jeans awkwardly. It was harder than normal for two reasons: I felt like I was underwater, and also the wetness of my jeans was making it extra difficult.

When my jeans were around my ankles, I realized I was wearing shoes, and I looked down at my feet with quirked eyebrows, before lifting my legs and plucking my black converse off without untying them. It was way too fucking hard; I started cursing under my breath whenever an article of clothing got stuck on some awkward bone or particularly wet patch of skin, and fucking finally, when I was bare from the waist down, a pair of sweatpants was handed to me.

I grumbled a thanks, and slid them on, (this went much faster and smoother than taking my jeans off did, and the outcome was much more satisfying), and, when that was all finished, a dry sweatshirt was handed to me, too. I grumbled another thanks, slipped it on, and then immediately crawled onto the covers of my bed and laid down on my side. I watched as Clyde and Token fidgeted with the two drawers that housed all my clothes, before walking over to me. They both sat on the floor in front of my bed, side by side, and looked at me.

“So. Craig.”

I groaned at the tone of Token’s voice. He sounded like a mother trying to breach conversation after catching her son masturbating.

“You want to tell us what the fuck that was?”

I shook my head, squeezing my eyes shut to try to block out my surroundings. “You don’t have to worry about it.”

“Well, we do, dude.”

“Why.”

“Because you’re . . . you’re _Craig_ , you’re our gang’s _leader_ ,” Clyde said incredulously, and I opened my eyes. Token’s normally apathetic-expression was actually gone, and he had a concerned frown on his face. Clyde was on the verge of fucking tears, but he was biting his lip to try to make the tears go away. He knew I hated when he cried.

“We’re not in fourth grade anymore,” I mumbled, closing my eyes again. “S’time to grow up.”

There was a beat of silence, in which part of me hoped they’d go away, but another part hoped they wouldn’t leave. Just them being there was more comforting than I had expected it to be. It felt . . . actually comfortable, like the huge gap of time since it was just the three of us, (or, well, usually Jimmy was there, too), didn’t even matter. Like we’d been best friends since we were three.

The silence was interrupted when Clyde sucked in a very audible breath through his teeth. “Dude, Token,” he said in a hushed voice. I kept my eyes closed. I didn’t really want to know what he was freaking out about. “Look.”

There was another beat of silence, before Token spoke, his deep voice no longer calm and collected. “Craig . . . did you drink _all_ of these?”

I turned my head groggily to where he was looking, and saw in his hands a couple of the empty bottles of vodka I’d stashed under my bed. I nodded, even though he wasn’t looking at me, and said, “Ngh-yeah.”

“Fuck, Craig,” Clyde said, under his breath, running his hands through his messy brown hair. His face was slack, and had lost most of it’s boyish excitement, or childish pouting, that were both his perpetual facial expressions. He stared at the bottles for a few more seconds before turning back to me, his eyes wide and sad. “Are you . . . okay?”

I blinked blankly at him. “Mm drunk'n hungover, but yeah.”

Token let out a breath. “Craig, man, why didn’t you ask us for help --”

“‘Cause you both piss me off and vodka doesn’t.”

I had never told Token before that he pissed me off, (because he never really had), but I had told Clyde that loads of times. Normally, he would’ve retorted with something horrifically unfunny, or he would’ve even gotten mad if the situation called for it, but this time he just shook his head, and he pinched the bridge of his nose. “Jesus, Craig. Just . . . how long?”

“How long what?”

“How long did it take you to drink these?” he asked, his voice sharp and firm.

I blinked some more. I’d never heard that voice from him before. “‘Week. I think?”

Clyde’s breath hitched. “You drank . . . _all_ of these, in a fucking _week_?!”

“Yeah.”

“Fucking . . . _why_?!”

I grimaced. He needed to chill the fuck out; his voice was piercing. “‘Cause I wanted to get drunk.”

“But _why_ did you want to get drunk? For an entire fucking _week_ , apparently!”

I settled as flat a stare as I could at him, and ignored the sadness and worry in his eyes. “‘Cause it’s better than being . . . not.”

They exchanged glances, their eyes saying something that I didn’t understand. And they just fucking stared at each other for a few more seconds, before turning back to me at the same time.

“We’re going to let you get some sleep,” Token said finally, standing up and pulling Clyde with him. “We’ll be back later, okay?”

I looked up at them, confused. And I mean, I wasn’t exactly opposed to them coming back, because their company really wasn’t actually . . . terrible, and being around them was actually the best I’d felt since Tweek left, even if it still wasn’t all that great. But their departure was . . . abrupt. And now that I had spent some time around them, I kind of didn’t want to be alone.

But then Token reached under my bed and pulled out the not-empty bottles of vodka. I quirked my eyebrows, growing even more confused as I tried to figure out what the fuck was going on. “Wait,” I mumbled, my eyes sliding from Token’s hand to his face, which was looking down at me with a sterner expression than I was expecting. “What are you doing?”

“I’m going to dump these down the bathroom sink,” Token said, handing the half-empty bottle and another full one to Clyde and keeping the other two full ones with him.

“No, wait,” I mumbled, pushing myself so I was half-sitting up and half-laying down. “Don’t do _that_ \--”

“Why not?” Token asked, raising a challenging eyebrow at me.

I narrowed my eyes at him, ignoring the throbbing that shot through my temple. “Because . . . because they’re _mine_ , and I won’t --”

“Be able to get it anywhere else,” Token finished for me, nodding firmly. “That’s kind of the idea.”

I couldn’t pretend with Token that it was that easy to get vodka without having to pay an absurd amount of money for it, or having to drink it at a party with other fucking people. I guess I could’ve stolen it from a frat house or something, but the trouble was too much, and it was easier to just . . . take it from the simplest source.

And it was different with Nikiel. He seemed like the kind of guy that had kept his nose clean his entire life. And, thinking back on the first night him and I got drunk together, I was _pretty_ sure he mentioned something about only getting an associates degree back in his hometown, but that was at the point in the night where I wasn’t can’t-walk-without-face-planting drunk, but the world still felt fuzzy and surreal, so I could’ve fabricated that whole memory. Either way, he didn’t really seem like he understood the goings on of that particular college.

Even if I _did_ manage to find another source, Token and Clyde were not going to let me near it. I had the sick feeling that they were going to hover over me at all hours of the day. And I wasn’t looking forward to it.

“Token . . .” I mumbled, trying to seem as sharp and aware as I could, “It’s not that big a deal --”

“Actually, it is a big deal,” Token said, turning away, and nodding to Clyde that it was time for them to leave. “We’ll be back later. Get some sleep.”

When I noticed that they were actually leaving, with my vodka, I felt a shameful desperation punch at my vocal cords, causing me to call out, “Please. Don’t.”

“Trust me, Craig,” Token answered, not stopping to even look over his shoulder. He tucked one of the bottles under his arm so that he could open the door, and he let Clyde leave first. Clyde looked like a fucking mess; but he kept his face hidden so I couldn’t see for sure. Token only looked at me when he was pulling the door shut, and he added, “It’s for your own good.”

And then the door was closed, and I was alone, and I felt very sick.

* * *

I guess the only reason that Token and Clyde left me alone that one time was because I was way too drunk to really make it anywhere on my own. But the second I sobered up, and I was back on my feet, I could tell that Token and Clyde were convinced I’d just whore myself out on the streets, or get in good with the crack cocaine crowd, or something equally dumb and unlikely. But, while I could laugh at the thought of their thought process, the fact of the matter was that they really actually seriously were going to attach themselves to me for the rest of the semester -- the whole week that was left of it. And I wasn’t looking forward to it.

Tuckers need their alone time.

And probably the final alone time I was granted came to a close however-many hours later, (I didn’t even check to see what time they left), when I heard a few gentle but loud knocks at my dorm room door. I had been sleeping -- heavier than I normally did, but I was a light-as-all-fuck sleeper, so I wasn’t surprised that a knock at the door made me jerk awake. I groaned; the sudden movement made my head throb and my eyes ache. My cranial area had gotten worse since I’d fallen asleep, and I wasn’t drunk anymore. Just really, really, really hungover. I debated just ignoring whoever was there, but then the knocking came again, and Token’s voice called,

“It’s just us, Craig.”

I sighed, realizing that, yep, this was it. The end of my solitude as I knew it.

I climbed to my feet shakily, pressing my palms to my eyes to try to make the sharp throbbing go away. It took me a few seconds to catch my balance, but I finally made it over to the door, and opened it slowly. I blinked a few times at them, but they were a little fuzzy and it was hard to look at something intently.

“Hey,” I said, opening the door more to let them in. My voice was deep and rumbly and slightly raspy from sleep, and probably some other stress-related . . . fucking something, I don’t know, but if Token and Clyde, (though, probably not Clyde), noticed, they didn’t say anything.

“Hey, dude,” Clyde said, his face pale and his eyes red. He was just crying. Should’ve fucking known.

“What do you guys want?” I asked, making my way over to my bed, crumpling down on it a little rougher than I meant to, and covering my throbbing eyes with my arm.

“We brought you some water and some hangover friendly food,” Token said, setting some shit down on my bedside table.

I sighed. I didn’t deserve them. Even if I was still pissed that they dumped fucking . . . three and a half bottles of quality vodka down a sink. “Thanks,” I mumbled, although the idea of eating was making my stomach churn painfully, so I dropped a hand to it in the hopes that it was make the puke stay away from my mouth.

“And a bucket,” Clyde added. Guess he noticed.

I _really_ didn’t fucking deserve them.

They were silent for a few seconds, before Token said quietly, “We just talked to Tweek, and --”

“Don’t want to fucking hear it,” I interrupted harshly.

Clyde let out a breath. “Didn’t think you would,” he mumbled, and that just made me feel even fucking worse, because it meant that Tweek really did actually hate me, and, even though Clyde didn’t tell me that in so many words, it was really fucking obvious. Because if it was good news, then he wouldn’t have just been crying, and he would’ve told me the second he walked through the door. Fucking child.

“You still have us,” Token said, his voice started to lift up as if he were trying to lighten the mood. It was a nice attempt, but it was also obvious that they didn’t fucking understand the seriousness of what had happened.

“No, Token, it’s not the same,” I said, my voice somehow harsh and subdued at the same time.

“I know it’s not,” Token said with a sigh. “I just want you to know that you aren’t completely alone. You never were.”

“I did a terrible thing, you guys,” I said, trying to keep my voice as blank as I could. “To Tweek, I ruined him. And Clyde, telling you that it was your fault your mother died, and Token, telling you that the only reason you were my friend was because you had an arcade in your basement, you guys should have left me _years_ ago, why are you still here?”

“Because we care about you,” Clyde said, like it was obvious. “Maybe we shouldn’t, but we do.”

“And Craig, that insult was from when we were in first grade,” Token said, and the heavy tone of his voice clearly held an eye roll. “I completely forgot about it, why didn’t you?”

“Because . . . it made you cry,” I mumbled awkwardly. The words sounded weird coming out of my mouth. “And, I don’t know, maybe it’ll surprise you, but I don’t actually _like_ making people cry.”

“We never thought you did,” Clyde said.

There was a brief silence. I still felt like shit, despite what Token and Clyde had said, because the evidence that I was a terrible person was right there in front of me: Token and Clyde dismissing the fact that I kept hurting them, the fact that Tweek’s side of the room was cold and empty, the knowledge that even Clyde and Token -- completely removed from the situation -- weren’t able to persuade Tweek to even _talk_ to me. Nothing I ever did seemed to work out in the end, and, not to sound like a complete asshole, but I never seemed to get just what I was looking for. It was always just out of reach; _Tweek_ was just out of reach, I could easily find him, but I knew that that was a really bad fucking idea. Especially considering, as of the past week, I couldn’t stand to not have alcohol in my system.

I had never really _wanted_ anything before. I had desired many things; guinea pigs, telescopes, the chance to go into space, but I had never _wanted_. Only desired. And I didn’t know _want_ until I met Tweek. I didn’t understand why people were so drawn to their one specific person all the time. And then I met Tweek and, even before I realized I loved him, I never really wanted him to go.

You know, I felt like I owed Clyde and Token an explanation. I had essentially just told them earlier that, to me, their company was second to Tweek’s, and that is such a horrible fucking insult. It would’ve killed me if it came from the right person, so, before I could stop myself, I said, “You guys? Can I . . . tell you something?”

“You can tell us anything,” Clyde said quickly. A little too quickly. He was probably excited that I was _willing_ to tell them anything; it wasn’t every day that Craig Tucker actually spoke about himself like the way he could probably sense I was about to.

“I . . .” I swallowed, burrowing as far into my mattress as I could. Part of me wanted my bed to swallow me whole, but I knew that that wasn’t going to happen, and I was so torn up inside, and I was about to puke all over the place, and, even though I wanted nothing more than to sleep and forget everything about my life, I realized I actually fucking cared about Clyde and Token. I mean, I already pretty much knew that, but it hadn’t really hit me until they were bringing me things to make my hangover better, and they were telling me we were still best friends, even though I’d been gone for four years, and that I’d spent all my time with Tweek.

“You don’t have to tell us if you don’t want to,” Token said, and, when I lowered my arm to look at them, he gave me a reassuring smile.

“What?” Clyde said, giving Token a shocked look. “No, fuck that, tell us.”

I felt the corners of my lips turning up at that, but they fell pretty quickly after that. “You might be . . . waiting for it, because it seems like fucking everyone is, but I’m . . .” I cleared my throat and covered my eyes so that I didn’t have to look at them. “I’m gay. And I . . . _like_ Tweek. But now he hates me.”

“Because you called him a fag,” Clyde said offhandedly.

I sat up so quickly that my entire world started vibrating around me. I put my hands to my temples and pressed slightly to try to make it go away. “How the fuck do you know about that?” I groaned, squeezing my eyes shut.

“We told you, we just went to talk to Tweek,” Token said.

I raised an eyebrow, but kept my eyes closed. “And Tweek told you that?”

“Well, no, Kenny did --”

I groaned again, shaking my head, which immediately proved to be a bad idea. “Fuck Kenny,” I grumbled. “He’s a fucking asshole, and I fucking mean that.”

“Yeah, we could sense that,” Token said nodding. “He told us we should ‘ditch you while we still could’ and that you deserved to ‘wallow’.”

“And what did you say to that?”

“I told him that, even though Tweek is your best friend now, you will always be my best friend, and I’m not going to just _abandon_ you because you pulled a full-blown dick and shouted the f word at Tweek,” Clyde said casually.

I felt my cheeks heat up, and it took a second for me to figure out why. I had never really realized how much Clyde actually . . . liked having me around. I mean, I wasn’t exactly the nicest person to him, but he never really left me. I felt myself smile at that. “Thanks, Clyde. You’re not the worst person I’ve ever met.”

Clyde laughed. “See, this is why Tweek and Kenny are so pissed. They don’t really get you.”

My smile withered instantly. “Tweek _gets_ me just fine.”

Clyde snorted. “No he fucking doesn’t. I’m not joking when I say you’re an asshole. You’re a total asshole; a hardcore asshole. You are one of the rudest people I’ve ever met.”

“You know, you’re not making me feel any better --”

“But that doesn’t mean you’re a bad dude. Like what you did for Jimmy back in South Park? You may be an asshole, but you’re a good fucking person.”

My jaw dropped, but only inside of my head. On the outside, I managed to maintain a perfect poker face. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Yes, you do,” Token said, and I could hear the eye roll in his voice. “Me, Jimmy, and Clyde have known this whole time.”

I stayed silent for a few seconds, but I knew that I’d been caught so I sighed deeply and said, “How the fuck did you find out? I never told anyone.”

“We were hanging out in one of the balconies. Jimmy was telling us what he planned to do if he did eventually raise the money. And we _saw_ you stuff a shit ton of cash into the collection box inside the theater,” Clyde said. “But you kept looking over your shoulder, and ran away as soon as you made it all fit, and then never mentioned it, so we figured you didn’t want us to know, and we never brought it up.”

“Did you know Jimmy actually cried when he saw you do that?” Token added. “He tried to hide it, but he was definitely crying. We had to talk him out of thanking you.”

That information made me extremely uncomfortable, but extremely grateful at the same time. Clyde, at least, had to’ve been aware of the fact that I did not cope well with crying people. And a crying person, saying thank you for something I had done for them was my worst nightmare. I would’ve just froze and probably would’ve run away as soon as I could.

“And you also beat up those four guys for Tweek, and you got him that coat, and you started walking him to his classes and shit,” Clyde went on. “We kinda figured you had a boner for him.”

I groaned, letting the embarrassment wash over in heated, uncomfortable waves. “Why are you accepting this so quickly?” I asked, my voice just barely a mumble.

“Dude, _all of us_ knew you were gay for Tweek, except for you and Tweek,” Clyde said with a laugh. “And are you even aware of how many chicks have been hitting on you this semester? I can’t even imagine how much ass you had in high school.”

I frowned. “I didn’t have any . . . ass in high school.” Clyde made a noise like he was about to say something that was going to irritate me, so I added on, “But how do you know I just didn’t _want_ to date anyone?”

“Because a man never turns down ass,” Clyde said proudly.

“Shut up, Clyde,” Token said, and I heard a soft pat noise, followed by a sharp intake of breath. I smiled. Clyde deserved a punch.

“Fine,” Clyde mumbled, huffing childishly. “But forgot all that, what’s the game plan?”

I raised an eyebrow, but kept my eyes closed. “Game plan for what?”

“For winning Tweek back,” Token said, as it that was obvious.

At that, I did lower my arm and stared at them, with as blank an expression as I could manage. “I’m not going to win him back.”

Token raised an eyebrow. “Why not?”

“Because Tweek’s never going to _take_ me back. Did he _act_ like he was going to take me back?”

“Well . . . no, but a lot of that was because Kenny was there.”

“If we get Tweek alone, then you could probably win him over, if you really tried,” Clyde said, patting my knee and smiling happily, even when I pulled away from him and glared.

“You know, Tweek didn’t even really talk until the very end,” Token added thoughtfully. “He sounded totally freaked when we told him about you being drunk in an alley --”

“Ugh,” I groaned, putting a hand to my eyes again. I wished they hadn’t told Tweek about that; didn’t really seem like something that I wanted him to know, even though I couldn’t really articulate why.

“--but then Kenny started talking for him, saying that you deserve to wallow and that, uh . . . what was that part about you and me being bitches in heat?” Token asked, turning his question to Clyde.

“Oh, yeah,” Clyde said, chuckling. “It was something like . . . he doesn’t care if we want to follow after you like _two bitches in heat_ , but he won’t let Tweek do the same. Yeah, it was something like that --”

“It’s not really Kenny’s decision what Tweek does and doesn’t do,” I mumbled, shifting awkwardly on my bed. “As much of an asshole as I am, I never _made_ Tweek stay away from anyone. He’s acting like he _owns_ Tweek or something.”

“Well it doesn’t help that Tweek has no idea what the fuck is going on, either,” Token said, and, when I looked over at him, he shrugged. “He doesn’t seem to know what he wants. The second he heard the words ‘Craig’, ‘passed out’, and ‘alley’, I thought for sure he was going to sprint his way over to you and punch anyone who got in his way. But he was too scared and confused to do that, and the longer he waited, the more time Kenny had to convince him that he needed to stay away from you.”

Well . . . at least being _confused_ about whether he hated me was better than him _flat-out_ hating me.

And, if I had to pick between one of those two situations, I would definitely pick the one I was in.

“Okay, so what do you have in mind?” I asked, pushing myself up slowly so that I was propped up on my pillows. I was only humoring them, really. As far as I was concerned, the situation felt kind of fucking hopeless. Although that might’ve been the hangover talking. “If Kenny won’t let Tweek out of his sight, how do I get Tweek alone? Without him screaming at the top of his lungs and punching me in the eye again?”

“ _Tweek_ punched you?” Clyde’s lips tilted downwards, like he was impressed by that. “Cool.”

“No, not cool, Clyde,” I said, glaring at him. “It fucking hurt.”

“Okay, guys,” Token said, because he could clearly see the argument bubbling behind Clyde’s opening mouth. “Back to the subject? Getting Tweek back?”

“Kidnap him,” Clyde suggested casually.

I felt like throwing something at him, but there wasn’t anything really all that good around me to do that, and I didn’t really have the physical energy to, anyway. “That would just give him a heart attack.”

“You could just knock on Kenny’s door and ask to talk to Tweek,” Token said. “Can’t it be that easy?”

“No, it can’t,” I said, shaking my head carefully. “Because it’s Tweek, and nothing is ever easy with Tweek.  Especially if that dickhole Kenny is involved.”

“So just get Kenny _un_ involved.”

“Thank you, Clyde, that’s what we’re trying to figure out --”

Clyde rolled his eyes. “No, I mean, _actively_ get Kenny uninvolved. Don’t hide from him, _make_ him cut the shit. If you don’t, he’ll keep getting in the way.”

I exchanged a surprised look with Token. Clyde didn’t often have . . . decent ideas, but when he did, it always took me (and apparently Token) a little off-guard. “Okay, Clyde, how do you think I should do that?”

He shrugged. “Talk to the guy. Go over to his apartment when you know Tweek won’t be there, and sit him down, and tell him to knock it the fuck off.” Clyde stood up from the floor and said, more boisterously, “Tell him that he is not gonna stand in the way of you and your man!”

I grimaced, narrowing my eyes at him. “Clyde, just . . . don’t do that.”

“Sorry,” he said, not looking the least bit apologetic. His dumb fucking smile got even bigger and his eyes got brighter. It was a huge fucking difference from when he first walked into my dorm room; his cheeks were all pale and splotchy, his eyes puffy and droopy like a kicked puppy. Jesus, he was almost as bad at hiding his emotions as Tweek was. “This is exciting, isn’t it? Just like the good old days! Except we’re all adults, Craig’s gay, and this really . . . isn’t actually all that exciting, is it?”

I exchanged another look with Token. “Not really,” he said, folding his arms over his chest. Clyde’s face fell some, but he wasn’t even close to looking how he did when I first saw him.

There was a bit of a lull in conversation, and my eyes were actually starting to melt a little bit as I felt my body beg for sleep. But before they could slide shut, Token asked, “Do you want us to hang out here for awhile?”

I looked up at him and quietly observed his calm smile. _Yes, I do_.

I shrugged. “Do whatever you want to do.” I didn’t want them to know that I wanted their company, so I reverted back to my age-old defense mechanism of being as vague as possible so that I could defend my negativity if they didn’t want my company, and confirm my desires if they did.

And I guess Token understood what I meant, because he stood up, stretched, and sat down in the crooked wooden desk chair. Clyde seemed to take the hint, and he climbed onto my bed with me, weirdly careful about avoiding knocking his chubby clumsy body into me, and he perched himself towards the end of my bed with his back against the wall.

Another lull into silence.

“So, Craig, how much studying have you gotten done? Exams start in three days, bright and early, Monday morning --”

I groaned. Because, fucking _yeah_ , I had forgotten about that in favor of some less _favorable_ activities the past few days. “Fuck, I forgot.” And before Token could even open his mouth to suggest we start right that second, I said, “Can it wait until my head doesn’t feel like it wants to explode?”

Clyde snorted. “And who’s fault is that, asshole?”

I rolled my eyes, tugging on the handles of my chullo absentmindedly. “Shut up, Clyde.”

Clyde and Token stayed until late that night, and they offered to crash there, too, if I wanted company. But I wasn’t willing to give up my bed, and no _way_ was I going to share it, and _nobody_ was going to sleep on Tweek’s bed, not if I could fucking help. So I told them I was going to be okay. And I kind of figured I might be, too.

* * *

Saturday morning, something . . . weird happened. I didn’t get to sleep until really late Friday night -- my headache persisted for longer than I expected it to, and Clyde and Token were pretty hesitant to leave -- so I didn’t wake up until like 2:00, and I felt . . . I mean, better, I guess, physically. My headache was mostly gone, I felt like I could probably stomach food properly for the first time in a week, and my vision wasn’t swimming like I had grown accustomed to it doing. I sat up and stretched my tired muscles, a painful yawn making my mouth gape awkwardly. I smelled absolutely fucking disgusting; it was probably the only time that I actually didn’t want Tweek around, because it was actually embarrassing how much I reeked. It was like a gross cross between sweat, stale vodka, and pain.

I looked around the room, as I did every time I woke up, even when Tweek was still with me. I don’t know what I expected, it was just an automatic thing I did, because I guess I still wasn’t entirely used to my surroundings yet? Or they were still new enough that I expected them to change every once in awhile. Usually, they didn’t, but that morning . . . they did.

Not by much, but, on my bedside table, there was a bottle of ibuprofen, a bottle of cough syrup, a box of granola bars, and a bottle of water, all of which were unopened. The water . . . could’ve possibly already been there, same with the granola bars, but I definitely didn’t put the ibuprofen or the cough syrup there, and I didn’t remember Clyde or Token putting it there the day before, either. They did bring me pain medication, but it wasn’t ibuprofen, it was aspirin. Maybe they snuck both there without me looking, when I was looming in and out of consciousness right before they left. It was the most sound theory I had come up with.

But the cough syrup was the kicker. Token and Clyde knew already that I wasn’t at risk of having a cold. I’d bypassed that possibility, and, even though Token was the ‘just in case’ kind of guy, he also wasn’t the type of guy to go out of his way to prepare for the extremely unlikely. And Clyde’s clueless, so I knew it wasn’t him.

It could’ve been . . . Tweek?

But that made absolutely no fucking sense at all, because why would Tweek bring me cough syrup? That would mean he knew I was laying in the snow for some undetermined amount of time, and that I quite possibly could have gotten a cold because of it. But not only would he have had to know about it, he would’ve had to care about it. And he hadn’t really been giving off the ‘I care about Craig’ aura as much as he used to.

But maybe it _was_ Clyde. That asshole was really, really clueless, so he probably thought he was helping me by bringing me cough medicine, even if the gesture was -- despite being . . . nice -- completely useless.

Yeah, it was definitely Clyde.

And other than the surprise nick-nacks on my bedside table, I also woke up perfectly under my blanket, which almost never fucking happened. I never moved around much in my sleep, but I moved enough so that my blanket got twisted in my long legs, and my upper body wasn’t even close to being covered anymore, but my blanket was tucked around my body neatly, and I didn’t remember doing that.

But, there really wasn’t any other explanation for it, other than the fact that maybe I did it in my sleep? And maybe Token and Clyde had extra medicine up their sleeves? I just shrugged and didn’t think much of it.

Nothing weird happened on Sunday or after my history exam on Monday, (which was _way_ easier than my professor was hyping it to be). Clyde and Token came back to my dorm room with me, (because I was still deep into ‘not allowed to be alone’ phase), and we studied together for awhile. And Clyde actually fucking _studied_ , which I did not expect.

And then Tuesday came around. Clyde and Token were coming back with me from my environmental science exam, we were all going to keep studying for the rest of our exams together, just like the day before, and probably the day after, too. And, at first glance, nothing really was out of the ordinary, and we just got to studying as was planned. But my eyes got tired of staring at diagrams of plant cells, so I looked up to give myself a breather, when I noticed something was missing from my bedside table.

Even though it was empty, I still kept my flask, because I’d had it since I was sixteen, and I wasn’t ready to part with it yet. It was a piece of my angsty teen years, but not the cringe-y kind, like a _My Chemical Romance_ poster, or a bottle of spray hair dye. So I put aside my notes for a second to hop to my feet and check under my bed, but it wasn’t there, either. I quirked my eyebrows irritably.

“Did you guys take my flask?” I accused, looking up at Clyde in particular, who had been sitting next to me on my bed, with his legs folded Indian style.

He glanced up and frowned. “No. Why do you need it?”

I shook my head, and decided to double check under my bed again. “I don’t need it. But I’ve had that thing since I was sixteen.”

“So?” Token asked, from his spot at the desk.

“So, even if I’m not going to use it, I still want to keep it,” I said, giving up looking there and standing up. “Neither of you took it?”

“I didn’t,” Token said, turning back to his notes indifferently.

“Me neither,” Clyde said, and, when I looked at him to see if he was lying, he shook his head to prove his point. But he didn’t have his lying face on, anyway, so I knew that it wasn’t him. He was very obvious when he lied.

I hummed and turned to my backpack, which was sitting at the end of my bed. There was no way it was in there, because I had never actually put my flask in my backpack since I took it out in the first place. I usually either put it on my bedside table, or in my coat pocket. So, with that thought, I picked my coat up from the floor and searched through both front pockets, but they were empty, (except for my key).

I huffed and dropped my coat back to the floor. I had no idea where the fuck that thing could’ve wandered off to. And I was usually so good at keeping tabs on my shit, because one of my least favorite sensations is when you lost something, and every place it could conceivably be is empty. It fucking sucks, so I make sure I know where all my shit is all the time.

Which was why it was so weird for my flask, of all things, to go missing. Because, back in Middle Town, the only places my flask went was my coat pocket and my backpack and, if my parents weren’t home, my bedside table. So, even after six months, it was still in the same place I had always kept it.

I guess I’d been standing in the same place for too long, because Clyde threw a pencil at me and said, “Dude, just find it some other time. You’ve got exams to study for, and it’s just a flask.”

Yeah, _just_ a fucking flask.

But he was right. I had more important things to worry about than a three-year-old flask that I didn’t even buy. Even though my gut was screaming at me to find the damn thing, I sucked it up and returned to my bed to keep studying fucking _plant_ cells. Because being an astrologist meant that I would have had to spend _sooo_ much time around plant cells.

Wednesday was pretty irrelevant in the weird department. Although, right after my exam, I went over to my biology professor’s office, (his name was Mr. Pratchett, I feel like I haven’t mentioned that yet), and spoke with him a little bit about my exam. I asked him if I was okay for me to take it early. I didn’t know if that was allowed, really, but, like he had told me the week before, for some reason he thought I was ‘special’, so I figured maybe he’d make some ‘special’ accomodations for me. I was desperate enough to utilize his favoritism to my advantage. It was an awkward conversation to say the least, but he conceded eventually, (after only, like, a minute of me trying to convince him, I just had to tell him that I had been studying a lot, which, granted, I had been), which was a fucking miracle, considering I was as vague as possible.

It was difficult finding a time to knock on Kenny’s apartment door, knowing that Tweek wasn’t going to be there, while also knowing that Kenny was. Because Tweek and my exams matched up almost perfectly, except for Tuesday. But then _I_ had an exam and _he_ didn’t, so that didn’t help me even a little bit. And Mr. Pratchett was cool, so I figured he was my best bet when it came to professors to persuade.

So, after I struck up a deal with my professor, I met Token and Clyde outside the left science building so we could walk to my dorm room. I told them about my conversation with Mr. Pratchett, and how Friday afternoon seemed like the time to pay Kenny a little visit.

“That’s works out pretty good, actually,” Token said thoughtfully, as we climbed the stairs to my dorm room. “Kenny is in my morning French class. And Tweek’s exam is in the afternoon?”

I nodded.

“Yeah, so if you take your exam early, you’ll make it to his apartment at just around the time he will, it’ll be perfect!” Clyde said, clapping me on the shoulder and smiling at me. I felt tempted to smile back, but I didn’t.

“So what are you planning on saying to him?” Token asked.

I shrugged. “‘Back the fuck off and let me talk to Tweek, you fucking asshole’, is what I was thinking of going with.”

“Maybe don’t start with that,” Token said with an eye roll.

I unlocked my door, shooting Token a sidelong, annoyed look. “The more I think about it, the angrier I get at Kenny for locking Tweek away from the world. He’s like the little devil on Tweek’s shoulder telling him all sorts of horrible shit about everything that’s going on around him.”

“Harsh words, Craig,” Clyde said, entering the room last and shutting it carelessly behind him.

“Are you saying he deserves less?” Token asked, dropping his shit on the desk and settling down.

“I mean, no, but, you know.”

I waited for Clyde to continue speaking, but I guess that was all that brilliant genius had to share, and we all fell silent as we broke open our textbooks and notes.

And then Friday rolled around. I went to Mr. Pratchett’s room four hours earlier than I originally would’ve. He gestured me in with a smile; he seemed really happy that I’d suddenly ‘taken an interest in my studies’, as he had so-optimistically stated, which was ‘something he hadn’t seen much from me throughout the semester’.

Well, the exam itself was pretty easy. I’d studied like fucking crazy, so I got all the Punnett squares problems right, and I labeled all the different cells correctly, and I wrote a detailed differential regarding meiosis and mitosis. Yeah, no fucking _way_ was I going to fail.

When I handed my exam over to Mr. Pratchett two and a half hours after sitting down, he gave me this wide smile and said, “I’m proud of you, Mr. Tucker. You really pulled through.”

I smiled awkwardly, turning away so I could leave as fast as I could and return to my Tweek-related problems. (I didn’t even really acknowledge the fact that that was my last exam of the semester, and that I was all-fucking-done.)

“Thanks again, Mr. Pratchett,” I said over my shoulder. “For all the . . . yeah.”

Mr. Pratchett chuckled and called out, “I wish you all the luck, my boy.”

I didn’t know what to say to that, so I just rushed away, in the direction of the apartment building that clyde and Token had told me to go to. I knew for sure Tweek wasn’t going to be there, and Token had told me that Kenny’s last exam on Friday was his French exam, so he was already finished.

All that was left to do was . . . get him to see things my way.

Shouldn’t be too hard.

The apartment building wasn’t a super long walk from the science buildings, and I didn’t know if that was a good thing or a bad thing. Because, on the one hand, it didn’t take too long to get there, but on the other hand, I had no time in between buildings to really build up a solid conversation plan. Which was something I’d put off doing, trying to focus on my exams first, and then trying to win back my best friend from the possessive claws of Kenny McCormick.

So when I did get there, I pushed the door open and headed in the direction of the stairs. “Second floor,” I muttered to myself, reaching the landing of Floor 2, and made my way down the hallway in search of the room number 212. I saw it a few doors down before I got there, and the only thing that was holding me back, really, was the weird off-chance that Tweek’s English Comp. exam was canceled or postponed for whatever reason. Other than that, I was more or less prepared to cuss Kenny’s bitch-ass out.

I stopped in front of the apartment number that Clyde and Token told me, and I bit my lip harshly as I raised a fist, knocking deliberately with the very top of my knuckles. “This is such fucking bullshit,” I mumbled, pulling on the handles of my chullo hat. Why I had to convince Kenny before I convinced Tweek to forgive me was so fucked up. But Kenny was looming over Tweek at all hours of the day, it was impossible to even be able to get him alone. I wouldn’t have been surprised if he monitored Tweek’s phone calls, too, which was even _more_ fucked up.

There was about a ten second wait, before the door opened, but only about three inches. The safety chain thing had caught it. Kenny stood there, his eyes narrowed in anger, and a frown I wasn’t used to seeing plastered on his face. “What the fuck do you want?” he spat acidically.

“I need to talk to you,” I said.

“No,” he bit back.

“It’s important.”

“Tweek’s here right now,” he said bluntly, as if that would _deter_ me. “And he doesn’t want to see you. You know, he’d probably panic and freak out. Do you _want_ that?”

I rolled my eyes. “Tweek’s not here,” I said.

With a raised eyebrow, Kenny asked, “How do you know?”

“Because he’s got his English Comp. exam right now, and he was most worried about that one, so there’s no way he’d be late,” I answered, feeling irritation creep up on me at the fact that Kenny thought I would just _forget_ about Tweek’s school life entirely. I had only spent, I don’t know, an entire fucking _semester_ walking to his classes and listening to him rant about lectures and assignments that pissed him off. So, yeah. Check mate, and I knew it. And I guess Kenny knew it too, because he huffed, muttering under his breath, “Goddamnit,” before closing the door, and opening it again a few seconds later, having unlatched the chain. “Come in, I guess.”

“Thanks.”

I pushed past him, and waited for him to lead me somewhere to sit. After he had closed the door, he took me to the living room, and I plopped down on his couch.

I wasted no time. “I need you to . . .” I rolled my eyes inside my head, because it was a request that shouldn’t have even been a thing, “. . . _let me_ talk to Tweek.”

Kenny laughed bitterly. “You’ve got a lot of nerve, Tucker. I don’t think I can make it any clearer: _he doesn’t want to hear from you_.”

“I know he doesn’t, but he needs to.”

Kenny looked at me with an expression something an odd cross between thoughtful, condescending, and infuriated. “You called him a fag, dude,” he said flatly, after that brief moment of silence. “You hit him where you knew it would hurt the most. Do you have _any_ idea what that did to him?”

I had no idea what to say so I just stared at him and waited for him to explain.

“Let’s start with this,” Kenny said, narrowing his eyes at me. “Do you know what he did when he came here?”

I swallowed, and shook my head. _What_ he did wasn’t a thing that had crossed my mind. I had been so wrapped up in _where_ he went that I didn’t even consider how fucked up he must’ve been when he got there.

“He was knocking on the door so loud, I thought there was an accident. A million things were running through my mind before I found out what the hell was happening. I imagined a lot of shit, but the one that hit me the most was Butters in the hospital, tubes and needles and wires sticking out of him. That’s how fucking panicked that knocking was. But when I ran to the door and flung it open, I saw your so-called _best friend_ , collapsed in a heap on the floor, sobbing his eyes out.”

My heart dropped to my stomach, and my knuckles that had my sweatshirt sleeves in their firm grips turned white. It was more or less what I expected, but it was still a sucker punch to the gut.

“He cried for half an hour -- a solid half hour straight -- before puking his guts out on my floor, apologizing like he’d just shot me in the face, cried for another ten minutes, and then passed out on my couch. The only thing I got from him through the whole thing was, ‘Craig hates me,’ ‘I hate Craig,’ and ‘I’m sorry.’ That’s all he said. Nothing else. I didn’t know what the hell was happening until he woke up, five hours later. He took an ibuprofen, drank an entire pot of coffee by himself, and told me about the fight.” Kenny sighed roughly, leaning forward so that his elbows rested on his knees, and he dragged his palms down his face. “You fucking _broke_ him, dude.”

I let that information stew inside me for a few long, agonizing seconds, but the guilt in my stomach could not have possibly gotten any worse than it had already been that entire two weeks that I’d been without Tweek.

“I never meant to do that,” I said quietly, tugging on the handles to my chullo.

“It doesn’t fucking matter if you meant to or not,” Kenny insisted angrily, lifting his head and glaring dangerously at me. “You still fucking said it. So, there you go. If that’s what you fucking wanted, for Tweek to get out of your life for good, then there you fucking go --”

“I’d spend every day of the rest of my life with him if I could,” I said fiercely. “Forget getting married, I’d just live with Tweek.”

“That’s _selfish_ of you,” Kenny hissed. “What if Tweek wants to get married? What if he wants to settle down with someone who’ll actually love him, and kiss him goodbye when he leaves for work, and suck his dick when he gets too stressed? What then?”

I shifted uncomfortably, my irritation slipping into embarrassment as I prepared myself for what I was about to say. “Well, I . . .” My entire face turned fucking scarlet, I could fucking feel it. “I could do that for him . . .”

I was expecting Kenny to be surprised, but he just smirked sardonically, leaning back in his chair and folding his arms over his chest. “I fucking knew it. Called it the second I saw you and Tweek together.” He shook his head, a weird cross between amusement and exasperation. “But do you think Tweek would ever want to talk to you again after what you said to him?”

I sighed. “No. But . . . Kenny, there’s something you need to understand. I like Tweek. I fucking _like_ him, dude. It’s . . .” I groaned. “It’s probably even the other ‘l’ word, okay?”

“Is it?” Kenny asked, his voice a bit too patronizing for my taste.

“Goddammit, yes,” I said, rubbing my forehead, already fucking tired of that whole part of the conversation. I hate talking about my feelings, especially with assholes like Kenny. “I probably like him more than you like Butters.”

Kenny snorted. “Not fucking possible.”

I narrowed my eyes at Kenny. “I don’t usually like people,” I said blankly. “Ever. I’ve never dated anyone before, because I’ve never cared enough to. And you know why that is?” I didn’t wait for him to answer. “Because Tucker’s mate for life. They don’t _do_ dating, they find someone and that’s it. And I’ve found Tweek, and he’s fucking _it_ for me.” I sighed. “Do you know why I said all that shit to Tweek?”

“Because you’re a confused dick that doesn’t know what he wants and can’t handle his own emotions?”

“No,” I said, ignoring the insult. “It’s because he kept leaving me for you. I would _never_ leave him off for anybody, and it fucking hurt like hell that he would. I thought he got sick of me, and that he was slowly replacing me with you, and I just . . . I didn’t want him to stop being my friend, but I thought for sure that that was what was happening. And I just thought that I’d abandon him before he abandoned me. I didn’t want to go through him telling me he didn’t want to be best friends anymore. I mean . . . I went too far, I know, and I realized that as soon as I said it, but he didn’t even give me a chance to apologize.”

“He shouldn’t have,” Kenny said with a shrug. “You said horrible things and I wouldn’t have waited around for an explanation, either.”

I ignored that, too. “That’s really just an excuse, though. It explains some things, but I’m just . . . I’m a total asshole when some part of my life suddenly goes to shit, and I can’t always . . . control what I say when I’m really, really pissed off.” I gnawed on my bottom lip anxiously, and Kenny had the decency not to interrupt me as I pondered what else I had to say.

“I . . . may have overheard a conversation between you and him,” I confessed. “He was telling you that he didn’t want you to tell me something. I don’t know what that something is, but that was the moment that I really realized something was wrong. I wasn’t used to Tweek keeping secrets from me, and I . . . it . . . with you, and I . . .” Unable to voice how I was feeling, I let out an irritated huff of breath.

Kenny observed me quietly, his anger gone and this weird cold skepticism remained. I didn’t know how to react to it, so I waited for him to talk. Which he finally did, about five seconds after staring at me creepily. “What’s the deal with you and that waiter?”

I rubbed at my eyes tiredly. I didn’t go there to talk about Nikiel, and I didn’t particularly want to, but I figured telling him all that shit would make things go smoother for me. “He’s my vodka source. I got to his apartment, we watch a movie, and he gives me vodka, and then I go back to my dorm room.”

“So there’s nothing sexy going on between you two?”

I blinked blankly at him. “Fuck no.”

Kenny looked me up and down suspiciously. “Tweek and I heard you guys talking last Friday,” he said flatly. “You were discussing his . . . dick size?”

I rolled my eyes. “Nikiel’s the . . . flirty type. Like you. It’s really obnoxious, but I kind of have to put up with it.”

“If you want to stay wasted all the time?”

I really didn’t like how people kept describing my inclination towards strong vodka. “If you want to put it like that, yeah. But Nikiel’s just a . . .” I quirked my eyes thoughtfully. “I . . . guess he’s a friend. I mean, he’s not Clyde or Token, and he’s definitely not Tweek, but I don’t _hate_ him. I feel bad for him, actually.”

“Why?”

“Because I can tell he doesn’t want to enable me, but I’ve been guilt-tripping him into doing it anyway.” I figured if I was going to get Kenny to trust me, I was going to have to be brute fucking honest. Because if he somehow found out _later_ that I was purposefully manipulating a nice person, there was no fucking way he was going to keep helping me. If he even decided to, that is. “He’s been a really good friend. He keeps telling me to be careful, and to take care of myself, but I’ve been kind of ignoring that.”

Kenny scoffed, shaking his head. “You are such a fucking asshole, you know that?”

I sighed deeply and toyed with the handles of my chullo and said flatly, “Yeah. I know.”

Kenny fell silent again, and went back to observing me from his seat across the room. I started squirming again, but I realized -- again -- that I should probably wait for whatever the fuck that asshole had to say next.

“What would you do if I said I would help you?”

I averted my eyes, trying to figure out how the fuck I was supposed to answer that. It was such a fucking awkward question. “I, uh . . . I would be sooo happy --”

“I sort of figured that,” Kenny said, rolling his eyes. “What would you _do_ , though?”

I leaned my elbows on my knees thoughtfully. Because if I had the opportunity to get Tweek back, I would do anything to get him to stay and never leave. The two weeks without him had been excruciating enough, no fucking way I’d be able to last the rest of my life knowing that I _had_ Tweek, and that I had fucked up and lost him.

“I would do whatever the fuck it took to make him stay,” I said, verbalizing my thoughts as accurately as I could. “I would get down on my knees and beg for his forgiveness if he asked me to. I just . . . I can’t do this without him.”

“Can’t do what without him?”

I sat back again, finding myself pretty much completely incapable of finding a comfortable position. “Any of this. I mean, life without Tweek was . . . okay, I guess, but that was _before_ I met him. Meeting him was like . . .” I let out a breath. “At first, I didn’t like him. He annoyed me. And then I realized that I didn’t have anyone else to hang out with, and he liked Red Racer, too, so I figured I’d just hang out with him because he was there. Even if I didn’t want to. And then it got to the point where it just . . . being away from him turned into this count down until I could see him again. These past two weeks, I haven’t _had_ a countdown. It’s just been a constant stream of . . . no Tweek. And it fucking killed me, Kenny. It’s _still_ killing me.”

Kenny looked at me steadily, as if trying to determine if I was being 100% genuine. I didn’t have to fake it, or exaggerate how serious I was about the whole thing, and I guess he _finally_ noticed that, because he slowly nodded to himself, and said, “Okay. I’ll help you.”

I felt relief spread throughout my body, my shoulders sagging and my face relaxing. “Good. Thank you.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he said dismissively. “I’m not doing it for _you_ , asshole, I’m doing it for Tweek. He’s missed the hell out of you since you screamed slurs at him. Talks about you all the time.”

I brightened at that. “He does?”

Kenny’s eyes narrowed again. “Yeah, but don’t let it get to your head. A lot of it has been completely rage-filled and negative. But it’s the fact that he keeps talking about you while _claiming_ that he hates you. So, no, he doesn't completely hate you. He just thinks you’re an asshole.”

I nodded. “I know he does. He’s been saying that since I met him.”

Kenny looked amused by that. “I didn’t realize Tweek was such an accurate judge of character.”

I rolled my eyes. “You’re fucking hilarious. How exactly are you going to help me?”

Accepting the subject change, Kenny said, “Make sure you’re at your apartment tonight. All night, by yourself.”

I eyed him suspiciously. That was the most ominous thing anyone had ever told me. “Are you going to tell me why, or is this a clever way to make me an easier target for the hitman you hired to murder me?”

Kenny rolled his eyes, leaning back in his chair. “Do you want my help or not? And if I wanted to murder you, I’d do it myself.”

I shook my head, folding my arms over my chest. He kept acting like I was this evil psychopath, which just told me that he didn’t really get what I was trying to tell him. “I don’t think you’re understanding me, McCormick. I mean, you make fun of me all the time for it. You apparently knew before I even realized it myself, but you seem to be forgetting that I _do_ actually . . . love Tweek. The fact that I’m an asshole doesn’t change that. I’ll always love him.”

“No, I get it,” he said, nodding. “I’ve known you loved him for awhile now. And I know you _still_ loved him even though you said all that shit to him. I _am_ capable of figuring things out, you know, I’m smarter than everybody thinks I am.”

“If you knew I love him, then why did you try so hard to keep him away from me?” I asked. A valid question, I was very confused.

“Because Tweek’s like my little brother,” Kenny said firmly. “He reminds me a lot of Karen. They both just need a wing to hide under.” Okay, so I wasn’t sure if that was true, because Tweek’s fists on the side of my face seemed to be really effective in the self-wing department. “And even if somebody loved Karen, and she loved them, the _second_ they pulled that shit with her, I would’ve pulled the plug on the whole thing. _Nobody_ messes with Karen, and _nobody_ messes with Tweek. Not even you.”

I blinked a few times at how angry he sounded. He sounded like a big brother. I recognized the sentiment; as much as I hated Tricia and generally acted like I didn’t care, I was protective over her to an extent. And I was _extremely_ protective of Tweek -- probably unhealthily protective of Tweek -- and even if Tweek came out and said that he and Kenny were fucking, and I . . . begrudgingly accepted it, if Kenny did what I did, I’d try my best to end it, too. I sighed at my own stupidity. “This whole time I thought you were fucking him --”

“Yeah, well. You’re a fucking idiot.”

I couldn’t really say anything against that, because I’d been thinking the same thing for the past two weeks.

“No, I mean, seriously. You’re _really_ dumb. How the fuck did it take you _that_ long to realize you’re gay?”

I frowned. It was _another_ question that I’d been asking myself, because, even though being in love with Tweek -- at that particular time -- sucked ass, the thought of him loving me back was just . . . I couldn’t even picture anything better. Being able to kiss him, and feeling him kiss me back . . . there wasn’t a better image I could possibly put in my head. “I don’t know.”

“I mean, even when Tweek came out to you, the thought didn’t even cross your mind?”

The memory of that night went rushing through my mind. Because it actually _didn’t_. I mean it kind of did, but it was more a thought in passing, and it was only to compare my family’s hypothetical reaction against Tweek’s family’s hypothetical reaction. Really, I was more wrapped up in the fact that Tweek was freaking the fuck out, and I was trying to figure out a way to make him stop. I shook my head. “I was a bit preoccupied. Tweek was almost crying when he finally admitted it. I was trying my best to calm him down.”

But remembering the actual coming out moment reminded me of the conversation we’d been having up until then. His naive reaction to my hypothetical situation, namely. I smiled and unfolded my arms so I could tug on the handles of my chullo. “You know, we were buzzed when he told me. But before that, when I first asked him if he was gay, he told me he ‘didn’t know what I meant’. So I gave him a scenario, about him walking in on a naked guy jerking off. I asked him if he was hard, you know, _in the scenario_ , and he just looked down at his dick and said, ‘You mean, right now?’” I felt my smile widen. “He’s . . . great.” I had no other words to describe him besides that. “Isn’t he great?”

Kenny cleared his throat, catching my attention, and my eyes focused on his smirking face. “Yeah, Tweek’s great. And you’re a fucking mushy romantic. Never thought Craig Tucker would ever like something other than his dumb guinea pig.”

I frowned. “None of the Stripes were dumb, and I like Tweek _way_ more than I liked any of them!” I blinked a few times at my sudden declaration, and felt my cheeks heat up. I coughed into my hand, averting my eyes, and added, “I mean . . . what I mean is, Tweek’s my new Stripe. There’s not . . . _that_ much of a difference. Well, I wouldn’t fuck a guinea pig. Or take a guinea pig on a date to the movies. But, like . . . I used to watch Red Racer with the Stripes all the time, so I guess . . . well, Tweek’s like a . . . a human Stripe --”

Kenny held a hand up. “Alright, stop. This is getting really fucking weird.”

I let out a relieved breath. I didn’t even know where I was going with my rambling. “Okay. So . . . you’re really going to help me?”

He nodded. “I’m really going to help you.”

I let myself smile at him. And he didn’t look back like he wanted to rip my gallbladder out through my mouth. Progress. “I’m serious, Kenny. Thank you.”

He smiled at me, an _actual_ smile, for the first time in weeks. “Just shut the fuck up, Tucker, and get out of my apartment.”

I nodded, and stood up, tugging on the handles of my chullo and walking in the direction of his apartment door. I turned around when I heard Kenny call to me,

“And remember, stay in your dorm room all night tonight! Just go there, and don’t leave!”

“This better fucking work, McCormick!” I called back, and didn’t wait around for an answer. I just opened the door, and left.

* * *

Kenny. That _fucking_ liar. He said he was going to help -- he told me _twice_ to make sure I was in my dorm room all night tonight, but it was midnight, and so far, I was still alone. I had no idea what to expect; part of me knew that Tweek was probably going to make an appearance that night, but I didn’t know when, how, or why. I didn’t know if he was going to be hesitant and regretful, like he didn’t want to be there, or if he was going to barge in all angry and start yelling at me, or if he was going to be sad and start to cry, and I didn’t know which possibility I preferred.

Because they all sounded absolutely fucking terrible.

I laid down on my bed with a long sigh, and faced Tweek’s side of the room. It was dark over there. Dusty. And, come next semester, it would probably be filled with a different person, because there was not a doubt in my mind that Tweek was going to request a new roommate. Or fucking just . . . move in with Kenny. His new best friend.

As soon as that thought went through my mind, loud noisy footsteps came running down the hallway, and then something hard and forceful smashed into my dorm room door. I jumped, sitting up abruptly, and listened as I heard panicked grunting sounds, followed by the thrusting of a key into a lock, and then --

“GAH! NGH! EHH! O-oh, God, am I too late?!”

I stared at him, Tweek, a million different feelings rushing through my chest. His face was red, eyes wild, hair untamed and unbrushed, and his cheeks wet. He’d been crying.

Fuck, he’d been crying.

But Tweek didn’t stay in that position for long, he bolted at me -- without even closing the door -- and launched himself onto my bed with me, straddling my hips and wrapping his trembling arms around my neck. I almost fell backwards; he suddenly flung 118 pounds of himself at me, and I was almost too tired to catch it all. I was shocked still at how violently he was shaking. I know I mention all the time how much he shakes and trembles and vibrates, but I wouldn’t have been able to hold him still, every muscle in his body was spasming, and it was made all the more obvious when he tightened his grip on my neck.

And, before I could really get my brain wrapped around the situation, Tweek managed to confuse me even more when he buried his face into my neck and cried, “AHH! Craig! Oh, God, oh, Jesus, no! Fuck, please, _no_ \--”

I swallowed harshly, slowly bringing my arms around his body and gathering him to me. “T-Tweek . . .” His name sounded weird coming from my mouth, mostly because my Tweek was suddenly just . . . hugging me, with no warning whatsoever, and it threw me more off course than I had already been. “What’s --”

“Are you okay?!” he yelled, pulling back, moving his hands so that they were clutching at my jawline, his nails digging into my skin.

“I-I . . . I’m fine, Tweek, what --”

His grip on me tightened and he narrowed his eyes. “So you’re not dying?!”

I blinked a few times at him, trying not to lose myself in the shine of his hazel eyes. “No?”

He deflated, his body flattening against me and he fought to catch his breath. I gathered as much courage as I could and let my hands draw circles along his back, trying to get him to calm down.

“Kenny told me you were . . .” he mumbled, nuzzling his boiling body into mine. It was weird; his hair was cold, and he came in without a coat on, (or even a sweatshirt, just his normal olive button-up, mismatched as usual), but his body was just as hot as it had always been before.

“No, I’m okay,” I said quietly, burying my face in his hair and hoping to fucking _God_ that he wasn’t going to pull away. “Are you?”

Tweek’s entire body jolted and he lifted his head, unwrapped his arms from my neck, and stared at me. “GAH! _No_ , I’m not fucking okay! Kenny just told me five minutes ago that you were on your fucking _deathbed_ , I thought you were _dying_ , and I didn’t even get to . . . we didn’t . . . I . . .” Tweek’s voice trailed off, but then he just growled angrily, and hopped up from my lap.

He started walking in the direction of the door, and my chest started to panic, and I was a half a second away from calling out to him to stop, but he didn’t actually leave. He shut the door harshly and then stomped over to his own bed.

I raised an eyebrow, but didn’t want to break the tense silence and shaky, unspoken truce we had just made, so I just watched.

Tweek never made his bed, and I never went on his side of the room for any reason at all, so his bed was the exact same way as it had been when he first left -- his blanket pretty much sideways, the sheets rumpled, and the pillow hanging half off. But Tweek didn’t seem too bothered by this; he just climbed on top, and adjusted himself so that he had his back pressed up against the wall, and he brought his knees to his chest, and he stared at me with his wide hazel eyes.

It was a familiar position. It was the entire first day we’d known each other, brought back full-circle.

So we were back at the start. The very start.

But at least it was something.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tell me what you think, please! The angst should be letting up, (SHOULD be), and I wanna hear your thoughts!!


	19. Even If You Don't Want Me Anymore

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's a little shorter, but hope you enjoy!

If you were to tell the Craig that existed at the end of August, that just staring at another guy would make his heart rate pick up, and his stomach yearn for something that seemed -- at that time -- unattainable, that included the lips of said guy that was making his heart rate pick up in the first place . . . fuck, he’d get _so_ pissed. But the Craig in that moment couldn’t look away, not for anything. And Tweek didn’t seem like he was capable of that, either, because his eyes were still glued on me, blinking very rarely to the point where it must’ve burned. The eye contact was so extensive, that, had Tweek been anybody else, I would’ve told them to fuck off a long time ago, but I hadn’t seen those hazel eyes in two weeks. I was trying to soak in the sight as much as I possibly could in case he suddenly got up and left.

After probably a solid minute of total silence, Tweek opened his mouth, but then immediately closed it again, like he was going to say something, but changed his mind at the last second. I tilted my head, silently asking him what it was on his mind, (besides the obvious), and, when his wide stare seemed to soften while also guard itself at the same time, he said, his voice stiff, “How are you doing?”

I blinked. Of all the things he could’ve said, I wasn’t expecting that. “I’m . . . okay.”

He rolled his eyes, slouching on his bed. “So you _haven’t_ been drunk on vodka for the past two weeks?”

I winced. I knew he was aware of my questionably-healthy decisions in the time we’d been a part, but it still hurt to hear him say it out loud. “Um . . .”

“Don’t try to deny it. I walked in on you, you know. I forgot a textbook and came to get it, and you were passed out on your bed. I could smell you from the doorway.”

My heart skipped a beat at that. I wasn’t intentionally trying to get him to feel bad for me -- I was actively trying to hide from everybody, actually -- but it still stung that he saw with his own two eyes that I was in hell, and, even if I deserved to be where I was, he still didn’t do anything. He just . . . left.

“Yeah. Well. I’m okay,” I said, my voice rigid as I built myself up again. My fingers twitched, and I clutched at my sheets. “Thanks for asking.”

He hummed irritably. “Yeah. _Well_. I was worried. Did you take any of the medicine I left you?”

I blinked again. Because the thought had crossed my mind -- it was actually the first thought that had crossed my mind in the moment -- but I didn’t think anymore about it. I figured it was stupid; I figured Tweek was way too pissed at me to do that, but the sincerity on his face told me that he wasn’t lying.

“I, uh . . . I wasn’t sick,” I said slowly, before narrowing my eyes at him. “That was you?”

He cleared his throat, his cheeks turning pink as he finally looked away from me, staring at his knees. “Like I said. I was . . . worried.”

I observed him quietly, trying to soak in the fact that Tweek cared at me enough -- just enough -- to be worried about me being sick. And to be terrified at the thought of me dying, apparently. Tweek didn’t seem like he was going to elaborate, so I tugged on the handles of my chullo and said quietly, “I thought you hated me?”

“I . . . I do!” he exclaimed suddenly, his head snapping up and his eyes widening beyond what I had previously thought was humanly possible. “I _do_!” His hands had found their way to his hair, and I could see, all the way from the other side of the room, that his knuckles were turning white from how hard he was gripping. I had to fight to keep myself from marching over to his bed and taking his hands in mine, if only to ease the pressure on his head, but logic, and Tweek’s panicked, biting words kept me in place.

I let out a breath, pulling my legs into my chest and resting my cheek on my knee. He sounded desperate enough in his answer, sure, and, like Kenny said, maybe he didn’t hate me entirely, but he still felt the need to say it, like he was trying to convince himself. So . . . I don’t fucking know, did that mean progress? It didn’t feel like progress.

“Yeah,” I said flatly, staring somewhere above Tweek’s head.

“NGH! Why do you look sad?” Tweek’s broken voice made me blink, and I met his eyes, which were wide and confused and kind of irritated.

I shrugged, and contemplated lying and telling him that I was fine, but lying was what got me into that shithole of a situation to begin with, so I averted my eyes and said, “Because I am.”

“But -- GAH! -- but _why_?”

I didn’t let myself look at him, because I knew I’d get even sadder if I saw whatever look was in his eyes. “Because I don’t want you to hate me. My life was better when you didn’t.”

Tweek didn’t answer, he just made those little anxious noises, and, even though I was too nervous to look at him, I could feel his eyes were on me. It was hard trying to come up with something to say to him; I’d been itching for that opportunity, to be able to explain and hopefully get his forgiveness, but now that he was on the other side of the room, attention glued to me, I had no idea what to do.

But I remembered what Kenny had told me earlier that day, that one of the reasons Tweek was so quick to avoid me was because he thought _I_ had replaced _him_. Because he heard me go off with Nikiel when I was promised vodka, and it came off as an _extremely_ different situation than what it really was. Honestly, I didn't really get why the misconception of my activities from that afternoon was so bad to Tweek; it probably shouldn't have mattered if he thought I was off fucking some guy, because the physical aspect of my friendship with Tweek never went beyond weird, spontaneous hugs.

Thankfully, the memory of that bit of conversation with Kenny helped me actually communicate with Tweek. So, when the silence was too much for me to handle, I looked up at him and blurted out, “There’s nothing going on between me and Nikiel.”

I was met with complete silence, which made me really fucking uncomfortable and awkward. “I mean, we’re . . . friends, I guess,” I said with a barely-noticeable grimace, hoping I was saying the right thing. “He’s not terrible. But there’s nothing more than . . . _kind of_ friendship going on.”

I glanced over at Tweek, and saw that he was gnawing viciously on his bottom lip. “B-but you were talking about --” he began, and I knew exactly where he was going with that, so I interrupted him.

“About his dick,” I said, matter-of-factly. “Kenny told me you guys heard. It didn’t mean anything.”

“Kenny told you . . .” he started weakly, before he shook his head and said more resolutely, “But, how can it --”

“Nikiel’s like Kenny,” I said, bringing my voice to a more soothing tone. “He flirts, constantly. It’s all I can do to get him to shut the fuck up sometimes.”

At my words, instead of the relieved expression I thought -- hoped -- I was going to be rewarded with, Tweek’s deer-in-the-headlights look rapidly turned to anger and he hissed at me, “Don’t lie to me, man!”

The sharpness in his voice, the clear pain behind his words, surprised me. His anger seemed so sudden; I didn’t know what to make of it. But the look on his face -- the unadulterated frustration, the blush of anger on his normally pale cheeks -- cut into me, because I was aware of the fact that I inadvertently caused it. “Tweek, I’m not lying --”

“ _Yes, you are!_ ” Tweek screeched, his legs falling in front of him, and his hands flying up to his hair. “That’s all you do is _lie_!”

I swallowed, hiding my face away from his unnerving stare. “The only time I lied to you was when I told you you meant nothing to me,” I said gently.

“You say that like you think I’ll fucking _believe_ you!” Tweek shouted, his eyes narrowing dangerously at me. “You say that like it _matters_! It doesn’t matter, it won’t _ever_ matter! You made that _clear_ two weeks ago, and you don’t have to keep pretending you ever liked me, because now I know the truth!”

“That isn’t the truth --”

“Why are you even trying?” Tweek continued angrily. “You hate this ‘stupid, needy faggot’, remember? You never cared about me, you were only pretending, why the fuck are you even _talking_ to me --”

“Why did you come here?” I interrupted quietly. “Even if you thought I was dying, you hate me, you said it yourself. So, why did you come see me? Why did you hug me? Why were you crying?”

Tweek’s rage fell way to hesitation and panic. His arms dropped to his sides, his eyes flitting all over the room as he clearly tried to figure out how he was going to answer my succession of questions. I felt almost bad about prodding his emotions so harshly, but I needed to break through the surface anger to get to his real feelings, the ones that weren’t influenced by Kenny or by the leftover adrenaline from our fight two weeks before.

But Tweek clearly had other plans, because instead of addressing what was being asked of him, he just glared at me and hissed, “Fuck you!”

I didn’t take kindly to that answer, because it wasn’t really an answer, so, being the fucking dumbass that I was, I loosened the flexed muscles in my legs and stood up. I needed to be closer to him, this arguing from two separate ends of a room was just not doing it for me anymore; I needed the advantage of proximity if I was going to solve the shitstorm that we were in the middle of. And I had only taken a few steps towards him, but the second he saw me move, he clambered to his feet, hurried to the far corner of the room, and pressed himself up against the wall, like he thought I was going to hurt him or something. It made the jolt of pain in my chest burn a little hotter.

“Get away from me!” he shouted, glaring at me to the point where I realized that getting any closer to him was the equivalent of stepping into a lion’s den. I took the hint, and stopped where I was -- awkwardly standing in the center of the room -- and watched as his glare stayed strong when he added, “Jesus Christ, I’m so fucking _sick_ of this!”

I observed him from where I stood and asked, “Sick of what?”

“Sick of _you_ , sick of _not sleeping_ , sick of _school_ , sick of fucking _everything_!” His voice and my heart broke on the last word, and his grip on his hair looked extremely painful. “Nothing’s gotten better, everything’s gotten _worse_ , and my parents called yesterday and they didn’t even fucking _ask_ about my exams, they just told me to watch out for a serial rapist in the area who targets small blondes, and I’m a small blonde, Craig, _I’m_ a small blonde, and now I have to watch out for rapists, and serial killers, and the Underpants Gnomes, which _finally_ found me, and I only have one pair left, and what if this is all that’s left for me, and I die all alone in a mental institution, because everybody I’ve ever known decided I was fucking crazy, and if I’m all cooped up in a mental institution, I won’t be able to buy my own underwear, and my entire life is crumbling all around me and I don’t know how to stop it!”

He talked so fast that it took me a long time to catch up with him, and, by the time I had, he was taking heaving, rapid breaths, and mumbled quietly, breathlessly, “I spilled my coffee this morning.”

I sighed deeply, and decided I’d ignore his clear desire to be as far away from me as possible, because at one time in our friendship, I _could_ calm him down, just by patting his shoulder or ruffling his hair. And just maybe a simple hand on the shoulder would be enough, (I couldn’t hope for anything more), but, when I started to walk towards him again, Tweek’s hands came up in a defensive stance.

“GAH! _No_!” he shouted. “Don’t touch me, you dickless . . . _dick_!”

I sighed again, backing off. I should’ve known that was going to happen. “Tweek, I --”

“ _No_! I don’t know what to do, I shouldn’t even care!” he insisted loudly, his eyes squeezed shut and his lips twisted into a weird frown.

There were many things that I could take from that statement: that he shouldn’t care but did, that he found it obligatory to not care given what I had done to him but did anyway, that he had gotten it in his head that I didn’t deserve to be cared for, but did anyway, every bit of my optimistic mind, (which, mind you, wasn’t that big a part of my mind to begin with, especially given the circumstances), clung to the implications.

“But Tweek --”

“ _No_!” he repeated loudly.

I rubbed the side of my face, trying to ignore the heavy feeling in my chest. In a way, it was worse than the last time he’d screamed at me. Because at least last time I could pretend that it was a just a heat-of-the-moment thing; he hadn’t _explicitly_ told me that he never wanted to see me again the first time. Just that he hated me, but even _that_ I could stupidly try to dismiss. But he said it again, with less malice and more desperation, and I could’ve made the argument that he wasn’t sure of the extent of his rage, but the fact of the matter was, he was more-or-less in his right mind. And sure, he had come to see me, but he certainly wasn’t acting like he thought it was a good idea.

“Tweek, I want you to listen to me very carefully,” I said, as calmly as my shaky voice would allow.

“ _No_!”

“Please, just --” I tried again, my voice turning into desperate pleas. I didn’t ever think it would be that hard just to get him to _listen_ to me. I had figured going into it that the difficult part would be trying to get him to forgive me, because in my, admittedly optimistic, fantasies regarding the situation I was in, he was always sitting at the ready to hear my side.

But he would hardly let me get a word in.

“ _No_!”

“For five minutes,” I said again, taking an imperceptibly small step towards him. “Five minutes, and then -- if you really want to -- you don’t ever have to talk to me again.”

Tweek hesitated at this, his spine straightening and his arms slowly lowering to his sides. His face looked conflicted, like never talking to me again was equal parts enticing and horrible. “Really?”

I swallowed thickly and looked at the floor. I didn’t like how hopeful he sounded when he said that, but I knew it was probably the only way I was going to get him to listen to me, besides faking I was dying. But that just seemed cruel, especially because he’d already gone through that once that night. “Really.”

Tweek’s face didn’t really look angry anymore. It had fallen into this completely apathetic expression, probably because he seemed to have _really_ thought about hearing my side, to the point where his thoughts must’ve been so hectic that his limbic system just shut down momentarily, and wouldn’t maintain his anger. “Alright.”

I let out a sigh of relief. “Thank you.”

Tweek just hummed in response.

“Okay, um . . .” I sat myself on my bed, scooching back to the center of the mattress with my legs crossed Indian style, and observed Tweek from across the room. His body language always gave him away, and I was especially skilled in the art of reading him. I could tell he was thinking about sitting next to me. His eyes were fixed onto the mattress, eyebrows knitted together, and he was bouncing his weight back and forth between his feet. “You can sit with me. If you want.” I cleared my throat, and looked away at the ceiling. “I won’t touch you.”

Tweek hesitated for just a few seconds more before he let out a long, deep, shaky breath, and slowly walked over to me, sitting on the very edge of my bed, but as far away from me as possible. I accepted that as a personal victory.

“The first thing you need to know, Tweek,” I said quietly, staring down at my hands, “Is that I am . . . so incredibly, unbelievably sorry --”

“I don’t want to hear an apology,” Tweek snapped harshly. “I want an explanation.”

I nodded, feeling, at that moment, very accommodating. “Okay.” I ran a hand down my face. “Okay.” The explanation that came so easily when it came to Clyde and Token bunched up in my throat, and the words just . . . weren’t coming to mind. I knew why I flew off the handle at him that day two weeks before that. I knew _exactly_ why, but it was really fucking hard trying to get the words out. Because, even though I figured some of that night would involve me talking to Tweek about what had happened, the possibility of me having to explain myself in all capacities, for some reason, felt extremely impossible. And I fucking prayed that Tweek wouldn’t ask a question that would prompt a . . . _more than friend_ confession. I wanted to stay as far away from that as I could. Because the fact of the matter was, Tweek was still in love with someone. He’d said it himself. And we had already established that it wasn’t Kenny, and we had _also_ already established that it wasn’t me, so that meant it was someone else, someone I either knew, or didn’t know, and I didn’t know which of those two possibilities was worse. So, for the sake of my sanity and my heart’s well-being, I had hoped my feelings for him would stay hidden for as long as possible. And anyway, it was hard enough telling fucking _Kenny_ about it, but _Tweek_?

“Your five minutes are ticking away, you know,” Tweek said mockingly. “Anytime you’re ready.”

At that, I began to panic. I had, in my lapse into Tweek-level anxiety, forgotten that I was on a time limit. “Alright, listen, the reason I got so mad at you that day is because I was really, really fucking _jealous_ ,” I said quickly, running a hand down my face as soon as the words left my lips.

I guess Tweek wasn’t expecting that, because, when I looked up at him, his eyes were wide, and his lips parted slightly in shock. When he caught my eye, he shook the expression away and glared. “Jealous of _what,_ exactly?”

“Of Kenny.”

Tweek didn’t even try to hide his surprise. “What? _Kenny_? Why?”

I frowned. “Because you kept ditching me for him. In case you never noticed, I _never_ ditched you. I couldn’t tell you the number of times I’d told Clyde and those assholes to fuck off whenever you and I were hanging out. I don’t really  _make_ friends, but when I do, then that person becomes so irrationally important to me. And it hurt like . . .” I let out a breath, staring down at my hands again. “It hurt like a _bitch_ that you . . . that you wouldn’t even . . . you were keeping secrets, and skipping into the sunset with that _asshole_ \--” My hands clenched into fists, and I glared at them. “I overheard a conversation between you and Kenny. You said, and I’ll always remember this, because I couldn’t even believe my fucking ears: _Remember, Craig can’t know about this_. You said you were . . .” I swallowed, but trudged on. “In love with . . . someone. I didn’t hear who, just that, for some reason, you didn’t want me to know. But the thing is, Tweek, I told you shit that I never told anybody else. Not even Clyde, and I was best friends with that dick for my entire childhood. I’ve only known you for four months, Tweek. For someone like me, that’s . . . our friendship has been _extremely_ fast-moving, and I was convinced you were slowly replacing me with Kenny and that you didn’t want to be my best friend anymore, so my plan was to end it before _you_ had a chance to end it, but I went _way_ too far, I know, and I’m so sorry. I can’t handle jealousy at all; you're my best friend, Tweek, even if you start dating a guy and want to spend all your time with him. It's just . . . I don’t want to share you." I sighed, closing my eyes. "I know it’s selfish, but I don’t ever like _people_ , or _things_ , and I like you so fucking much, and it just . . . it _killed_ me that you trusted fucking _Kenny_ more than me.”

That wasn’t exactly the whole story, but . . . we didn’t have to get to my confession _just_ yet, did we? I mean, that wasn’t really relevant at the time, was it? As far as I was concerned, it didn’t even have to happen at all, because it wasn’t a part of the whole ‘apology/explanation’ part. And I was fully prepared to keep that from him for as long as I possibly could.

There was a long drawn out silence following my explanation, and I didn’t dare look at Tweek. I didn’t want to know what he was thinking, (whatever _mental_ reaction he had would definitely have made it to his face), so I kept my eyes trained on my fidgeting hands.

I only glanced up when I heard Tweek’s suddenly meek voice mutter, “It . . . it wasn’t about trust.”

He looked incredibly hesitant, his eyes averted somewhere to his side of the room while his face was facing me fully. He was frowning shakily, his eyes twitching every once in a while, and his hands were gripping at the front of his shirt, like a lifeline. Like just grabbing hold of it was the only thing keeping him grounded.

I sighed. “Then what _was_ it about?”

“Craig, I . . .” I guess my speech really got to him, because there wasn’t a hint of anger left in his body language, his expression, or his voice. Just pure, unpolluted anxiety. “I can’t tell you.”

I let out a deep, slow, quiet breath. “Why not?”

“Because . . . just . . .” Tweek suddenly shot up like was stabbed with an iron-hot poker and started pacing around the room in wild circles, his hands yanking at his shirt and his steps jerky and uncoordinated. “Because I can’t, alright! I just _can’t_ , and that’s that!”

“That can’t just be that, Tweek,” I said, ignoring how weird that sentence sounded on my tongue. “Being friends, let alone _best_ friends, is going to be _really_ hard if you don’t trust me.”

“It’s not about trust, Craig!” he insisted loudly. “I promise it’s not!”

“Well, I can’t possibly fathom what it could be about then,” I said. I was beginning to get irritated again. I knew for a _fact_ that I wasn’t going to make the same mistake again, but I knew that a lot of the remorse I had felt was starting to wither away.

“Craig, you have to trust me --”

“That’s not good enough, Tweek,” I said, looking away from him. “I don’t know much longer I can do this. These past two weeks have been _hell_ , but you apparently already noticed that.”

I felt the mattress shift, and when I glanced up again, he was sitting right in front of me, his hands in his lap and his eyes glued to my face. “I listened to you, and now you need to listen to me,” he said. There was still no anger in his voice, but he wasn’t _quite_ void of emotion. There was some spark of . . . _something_ , but I didn’t know what to name it, so I instead focused on his words. “You are the first friend I’ve ever had.”

My heart soared, and, even though I felt a smile tug at my lips, I forced it down. Because he said _are_. I tried not to let it overshadow the point he was trying to make, (even though that was really, really hard to do), and I listened more intently to his words than I had been before.

“I know I talk about my ‘friends’ from Denver, but . . . I didn’t have _any_ friends in Denver. Except for maybe this old lady that would come into the coffee shop and give me these butterscotch candies, and my Uncle Bryan, but other than that, I was . . . alone. Nobody at my school could tolerate my . . . twitching, or my voice, or . . . or anything about me. If they weren’t pushing me around and stealing my stuff, they were ignoring me.”

Tweek paused, observed me thoughtfully, his lips quirked off to the side as he tried to gather his thoughts. “I don’t actually hate you, Craig,” he said, letting out a soft breath. “You’re my best friend, I like you too much to hate you. I never really wanted you out of my life for good, I was just so angry at you for saying all that shit to me, and I . . . I didn’t think I deserved it, but I didn’t realize you’d heard me talking to Kenny, and I didn’t even think about how it would feel if I’d overheard you have the same conversation with someone else. I’m sorry for keeping secrets from you, it’s just that you’re the one who taught me how to stand up for myself, and to not take shit from anybody, and to not be afraid of every person that ever tries to talk to me, and I _can’t_ lose that, and that’s why your friendship is so important to me, and that’s why I . . . I _can’t_ tell you this, because it will ruin everything.”

“Tweek, I’m sorry I hurt you,” I said, tugging on the handles of my chullo. “You didn’t do anything wrong. I would have preferred you trusted me, sure, but you didn’t deserve what I said to you. What I said to you was awful, and if I could find some way to take it back, believe me, I would in a fucking heartbeat.”

“You shouldn’t have called me a faggot,” Tweek said quietly, staring down at his hands.

I let out a shaky breath and nodded. “I know. I wasn’t thinking, and it just came out, and I’ll do anything to get you to forgive me, and to start trusting me again.”

When Tweek didn’t answer me, I moved towards him, and slowly put my hand on his shoulder, holding my breath when he flinched, but then sighing in relief when he didn’t push me away. “And, just so you know, there’s _nothing_ you could tell me that would ruin our friendship. Unless you’re trying to tell me you, I don’t know . . . killed my family, or something.” I blinked at the completely off-chart example I gave him, but I brushed it off quickly enough, and offered him a weak smile. “You didn’t kill my family, did you?”

Tweek shook his head erratically.

“Well, then I can’t really think of anything that would make me not want to be around you.” I paused, my eyes sweeping his face as he trembled under my hand. “You know, Tweek, _not_ saying anything is probably worse.”

Tweek’s eyes were wide and wet and full of desperation and fear. I seriously couldn’t imagine what the hell he didn’t want to tell me that was _that_ bad, but Jesus fuck, what I wouldn’t give to make that expression go away . . .

“You can trust me,” I said quietly, lowering my voice to that calming tone that I hadn’t been able to use in two weeks. “I won’t get mad at you, I won’t yell at you, and I won’t abandon you. Even if you don’t want me anymore, I will _always_ be here for you, and I’m not going to let you be alone. Not _ever_ again.”

The majority of Tweek’s reaction to my comforting words was just heavy, heavy doubt, but I just smiled at him as best I could, given the mentally exhausting situation. I had already said pretty much what I could come up with, and it was just up to him to decide whether or not he actually trusted me.

As I waited for Tweek to say something, or do something, I absentmindedly took my hand from his shoulder and brushed a lock of blonde hair behind his ear. A string of several emotions shot across Tweek’s face, and his eyes didn’t stray from me for a second. He was doing that thing where he was trying to figure out if he could trust me or not, but this time, _so_ much more was on the line than before, and I was willing to do _anything_ to get his trust back. So I said one more thing, in the hopes that it would sway his decision one way or another:

“Tweek, you’re good enough. You’re smart enough. And doggone it --”

Tweek whimpered, and, before the rest of the speech could leave my mouth, a pair of trembling hands seized the front of my sweatshirt, and my reassurance was cut short by Tweek’s lips.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here I am again, deciding at the last second to chop chapters in half and prolonging the epilogue!! :)
> 
> I hope you guys liked it, even if it's reminiscent of the super short chapters from the beginning of the story. (The first chapter was 5 pages of a google doc, and the longest chapter was 33 pages of a google doc so... go nuts with that information, I guess.)
> 
> Tell me what you think of it, please! I'm very curious, this was all one scene entirely focused on inner dialogue and verbal dialogue, without much action plot, so I'm a little worried how that's gonna go over.


	20. Don't You Ever Forget That

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter kicked my BUTT, and I am so so so sorry it's late! And I'm also sorry if it sucks, because this was, hands down, the most difficult chapter for me to write, but I wanted it to be as good as possible, and it took me too long a time to achieve that
> 
> Well, anyway, I hope you like it!

 You know that feeling when you want something to happen, (and you’ve wanted it to happen for a while), and it’s been eating you up inside . . .

And then it finally happens?

Well let me tell you how it feels.

It doesn’t feel real.

I jolted, my hands reflexively jerking up and clutching at Tweek’s elbows, and my eyes widened in surprise, and disbelief, and shock, and . . . oh, Jesus, _fuck_ , I couldn’t move, it was like someone had replaced my bones with logs of cement. There was so much fucking happening, in a moment of very little physical movement; I couldn’t decide which sensation to focus on: his trembling lips, the stretch of my sweatshirt from how hard he was pulling on it, the locks of blonde hair that were tickling the frame of my face, or my heart that was racing so fast that it felt like it wasn’t even pumping blood at all anymore. It was just seizing in my chest. Tweek had to’ve felt my heart pounding, even through my sweatshirt, because, even in the heat of it all, I was positive I could fucking _hear_ it. But if Tweek did feel it, then he just ignored it and went right along awkwardly sliding his lips against mine. It was obvious that he’d never done anything like that in his entire life, and he was trying his best to mimic what he probably thought kissing was like.  

The kiss only lasted about five seconds, before Tweek’s eyes blew wide open and he suddenly launched himself away from me, almost propelling himself off of my bed, a look of absolute panic on his face. “GAH! EHH! Oh, _God_ , oh, _Jesus_ , Craig, _shit_ , I’m sorry --”

Tweek’s rapid spiral into anxiety in it’s most raw state brought me back to my senses. He was about to run away, I could tell by how his eyes kept flicking to the door, and how the muscles in his legs flexed, and I felt my heart hammer in my chest at the cruciality of the situation. Because if I didn’t act right away, Tweek would probably never let me be in the same room as him again.

“Wait!” I exclaimed, grabbing onto his upper arm and holding him in place. He struggled, his arms flailing and his chest heaving and his head whipping to stare at the door, a distressed, desperate longing in his gaze. But there was no fucking way I was letting him get away without an explanation. Your best friend can’t just kiss you and then run away without saying anything. If he left right then and there, it wouldn’t’ve been fair, to either of us.

Tweek’s struggles didn’t slow, and there were no words that were coming to mind that would make him calm down, not even his Stuart Smalley mantra; there was clearly only one thing he wanted right then, and that was to high tail it the fuck out of our dorm room. With my mind somehow both overflowing with thoughts and also being completely empty, the only coherent thought I had was to somehow show him that he wasn’t alone -- which was very obviously what he thought -- and that my strongest stance on the spontaneous, unexpected kiss that he had just given me was only that it ended way too soon. I mean, I was confused as fuck, but the pleasure of even just the menial intimate contact far outweighed my confusion. For the time being, anyway.

But I’m mediocre at best at explaining my emotions, and there was no way I would’ve been able to convey those thoughts in words, so instead of even trying, I let go of his arm, but then quickly grabbed his cheeks, turned his head to face me, and pulled him into another kiss.

I wasn’t really thinking about what I was doing, which wasn’t really me. I generally thought through my actions before saying or doing anything, so that I wouldn’t say or do something that I would regret. (Of course, as I’m sure you’ve noticed, I’m not always the best at it, but I’ve never been one to compulsively act first, think later.) But then his lips puckered back, and, even though it was probably a subconscious reaction, it happened anyway, and I was immediately encouraged to kiss faster, harder, more passionately, thrusting as many of my feelings for him into the kiss as I possibly could. Because . . . he kissed me first, right? Actually, literally _did it_ ; there was no projecting on my part, and that had to mean _something_.

I kept my eyes shut tight, not willing to risk catching a glimpse of his reaction. It could either go over really well, or really badly, and I was nervous for, honestly, whatever response he could’ve given me. I was so far out of my comfort zone; the only person I would even _consider_ doing anything like that to was Tweek, and even then it had only ever happened in my dreams, because dreams were different; I’d do anything and everything to him in my dreams, but reality was so much scarier. I didn’t think my heart could handle being pushed away from him, not after a week of chain drinking, and then another week of constantly staring at my barely-legible notes and suffering through exams. My brain was already the consistency of liquefied tofu, so I did not fucking need a rejection on top of it all.

Because I couldn’t even picture what my life would be like if he rejected me. It would . . . suck. To put it fucking lightly; the fabric of my existence would’ve come undone, and I know that sounds dramatic, and kind of like a thirteen year old wrote it, and like my happiness relied way too much on this five-and-a-half foot man-child that I hadn’t even known for six months, but this was my _Tweek_ I’m talking about. If he was just caught up in the moment and didn’t mean it, then there wasn’t a single other person out there for me. Because I’m a Tucker, and Tweek was my person, and I could only hope I was his person, too.

Maybe half a minute later (or a second, or an hour, I had zero fucking clue), Tweek put his hands on my shoulders and pushed me away. Even though my chest was shoved backwards, my head stayed where it was, and my lips only left his when Tweek shook his head and mumbled something into my mouth. We separated with a soft smacking noise, and my eyes were hazy and unfocused when all physical contact was null and void. It took me a little bit to come back to my dorm room from some far away planet in space, but when I did, and my eyes zeroed in on Tweek, I was a little surprised to see the fear and bafflement on his face. I crossed my fingers in my mind that his reaction was just shock, which was the explanation for _my_ lack of reaction when he kissed me.

We held eye contact for a few seconds, Tweek’s hands covering his mouth as if he were protecting his lips from any other unwarranted and apparently _unwanted_ kisses. His eyes were pretty much bugging out of his head, and I could just barely understand him when his muffled voice screeched, “GAH! You just _kissed_ me!”

I frowned dazedly at him. That _really_ wasn’t the response I had wanted, or even expected. “You just kissed _me_ ,” I retorted, staring at him as steadily as I could, unimpressed by his hypocrisy.

Tweek shook his head jerkily, completely ignoring me. “Why did you _do_ that?!”

I blinked at the question, and averted my eyes. “Because, uh . . .”

 _Yeah, Craig, why the fuck_ did _you just do that? Tell him. Fucking tell him. Quit being a fucking pussy, look him in the fucking eye and_ tell _him why you just kissed him_.

That kind of self-motivation usually worked on me: imagining that I was some giant, massive, scary-looking guy yelling at me to stop pussy-footing and actually fucking do what I was trying to do. Tough love was usually the easiest way to get me to do hard shit, but there was no love in this world tough enough to get me to confess to him. So I let out a breath and said, “Because . . . you did it first,” which wasn’t technically a lie, and would do just fine as a stand in for the actual truth.

“Well, I didn’t _mean_ to!” Tweek exclaimed, his hands sliding up his cheeks and disappearing into his mane of blonde hair.

Tweek’s words did not make me feel good. At all. I was still all fuzzy inside from before, but that fluffiness was starting to wither, and I didn’t want to fuck around and wait for everything to explode. So I folded my arms over my chest protectively, furrowed my eyebrows, and said, “How can you kiss someone and not mean to?”

Tweek’s eyes flitted around the room desperately, like he was looking for a way out of answering. Ultimately, I guess he didn’t find what he was looking for -- or maybe he did, I didn’t know, because I didn’t know what he was looking for to begin with. His eyes locked onto me, and he growled, his teeth bared angrily at me, like I had done something wrong.

“No, you know what?” he said, as if he’d just had some grand epiphany. “I’m _sick_ of hiding it! Kenny was right, lying and keeping things from you is only making things worse! So guess what? I _did_ mean to kiss you, and I _don’t_ regret it.”

I blinked a few times at him, soaking in the determined, stubborn look in his eyes. There was more determination in his gaze than I’d ever seen from him, like he was prepared to bite the bullet and actually fucking tell me what was going through his mind. I recognized in that moment that he had way more courage than I did. Because those words _never_ would’ve left my mouth.

But Tweek’s motivation for kissing me, and my motivation for kissing him, were two completely different things. I loved him. And the fact of the matter was, he didn’t love me back. But I just couldn’t fathom why he would kiss me in the first place, and, because of my confusion, I wasn’t quite sure how to respond to his announcement, so I said slowly,  “Okay, so what did --”

“GAH! Please just _listen_ to me, this is _important_ ,” he said harshly, and the tone of his voice made my mouth snap closed and my eyes widen. I was always caught completely off guard whenever Tweek took control like that; I was so used to being accidentally-Alpha Craig, inadvertently making people either fear me, or respect me out of fear. I never really cared either way, but I’ve been told by several people that I’m not the most inviting person. It’s not like I _mean_ to be that way, but regardless, Tweek seemed completely immune to that part of me, and just did whatever the fuck he wanted to all the time.

I snapped back to reality when Tweek’s end of the mattress bounced as he jumped to his feet. For the first time in the time I’d known him, he wasn’t pacing anxiously, even though there was obviously strong anxiety behind the stubbornness in his eyes. He just stood still in the center of the room, his hands balled into fists at his sides, but, before I could ask him what the hell was going on, he ground out, almost angrily, “ _I like you._ ”

I stared at him, right into his narrowed, glaring eyes, unwilling to look away just in case he suddenly bolted out our dorm room door. I tried to keep my hope at the bare minimum. ‘Like’ could mean lots of things, but, because I knew for a _fact_ that he didn’t love me, he probably just meant it as . . . best-friend-like. Or friend-like, at least. Why he was being so fucking weird about it, though, I didn’t know; but Tweek, as a rule set by the universe, was weird, so I just accepted his unnecessarily ominous statement. “Yeah, Tweek, I . . . I like you, too --”

“No,” Tweek said, sucking in a long, shaky breath. He hesitated, and, for just a second it looked like he was preparing to back pedal, but then he squeezed his eyes shut and said forcefully, “I . . . _ngh_ . . .  I’m gay and I . . . and I _like_ you . . .”

An involuntary shudder ran down my spine at his words, because _fuck_ , they implied so fucking much. I knew he was gay, and I knew he liked me because he had literally just told me, but the fact that he put the statement together like _that_ was a stinging bitch slap to my heart.

“I don’t --” I mumbled, studying his face carefully to find any signs of deceit. Something told me he wouldn’t screw with me about shit like that, but I wasn’t confident in our friendship yet to know for sure. I needed to know if he was just batting me around like a cat bats around a ball of string.

Fuck, I was _not_ going to be some stupid ball of fucking string.

Tweek interrupted me, his voice acidic and impatient. “I fucking _like_ you. Okay? I _fucking_ like you. I’m gay, and I like you like a gay guy likes another guy.”

I know I probably should’ve felt relief or something, but I was so stunned by the evolution of my night, and the sensory overload of the fact that, not only did Tweek kiss me of his own free will, but he also . . . _liked_ me? After everything I’d done to him, after all the shit I dragged him through, and he _liked_ me? Fuck, I could maybe understand it _before_ our fight; in retrospect, a lot of the ‘platonic’ niceties that I had done for him seemed waaaay less platonic after the major epiphany I had. What straight, impartial man harbors such violent admiration for another man? (The fact that I had tried to hetero-ize the sex dreams I was having about him didn’t help that, either.)  

But then I made him _cry_ , and I fucked with his emotions by telling him he was my favorite person and then turning around and telling him I hated him; he had no business liking me ‘like a gay guy likes another guy.’

But his words were out, and I had no desire to argue against him. Why would I? It was what I wanted to hear, despite the fact that it was too unbelievable to be true.

So I swallowed heavily and squeezed my eyes shut, thinking viciously, _You better not be fucking lying to me, you piece of shit_. I tried to get myself to say something, anything, but preferably something similar to what Tweek had just said; if I waited too long, Tweek would get anxious and run away from me so fast I wouldn’t even see him move, and then, even if I did manage to catch him and force the fucking words out, he’d probably assume I was lying to him. I was just happy that he gave me a few seconds to at least attempt for his words to soak in, because the ferocious sincerity didn’t waver from his face in the beat of silence that I took to try to wrap my head around his announcement.

A white-hot adrenaline built in my veins the longer I just sat there, and, before I could stop myself, I blurted out quickly,

“I’m gay and I like you, too.”

My voice was fast and nervous and full of a hope that I didn’t usually let myself feel. And, adding on to my uncharacteristic display of vulnerability, I had to wait an agonizing _four solid seconds_ for a response, and it was about what I expected:

Tweek shrieked, taking a few hurried steps backwards and tripping over his own feet. I was surprised by how fast he moved -- maybe it was the coffee, but Tweek had the uncanny ability to move too fast for the human eye to perceive -- and I held a pretty useless hand out, a concerned “Are you okay?” on the tip of my tongue, but not quite making it’s way out. Tweek shook his head rapidly, no doubt confused by how fast he had suddenly found himself on the floor, and his eyes widened when he stilled, exclaiming, not even bothering to stand up, “Oh, Jesus, no you’re not! And you _don’t_!”

I more or less anticipated that, so I put both of my hands back in my lap and gave him a shaky smile. He didn’t smile back. “Yes I am. And I do.”

“No, you’re _not_ , Craig, and you _don’t_ , you’ve said it a _thousand_ times, how --”

“Tweek,” I interrupted, trying to ignore the tremor in my voice. “Forget what I said before. Forgot a _lot_ of what I said before. I’m really, really, really stupid when it comes to shit like this. Just know that, ever since I met you, I’ve felt . . .” I cleared my throat awkwardly. “Different. And it turns out I’m a lot, um . . . _gayer_ than I thought I was.” I scratched the back of my neck, scrunching up one side of my face at my own words. “Specifically for you.”

When all Tweek did was stare at me with wide eyes and tremble where he sat, I slowly -- and very awkwardly, considering I was hyper aware of everything I was doing -- rose to my feet and took a small step towards him, my hands raised up innocently like I was approaching an easily-excitable animal.

Fuck, I was so fucking nervous. It was a feeling, almost primitive, that really couldn’t be put into words, although it was similar, I guess, to the whole fight or flight thing. I knew I should’ve been _happy_ that he actually liked me back. I had no doubt that he was telling the truth; Tweek wasn’t one to just make up shit like that, and especially not be so convincing. But why I was so scared, I couldn’t really explain, not even to myself, but my heart was hammering in my chest -- Jesus, Tweek was going to give me a heart condition if he kept just . . . _existing_ \-- and just the thought of any response from him was stirring the bile in my stomach.

“Tweek . . . Tweek, I know you already know this, but I’ve never been very . . .” I pursed my lips. “ _Patient_ with most people. Almost everybody I’ve ever met have been obnoxious, selfish, and incapable of removing their heads from their own asses long enough to realize that the world has always sucked, and always will suck, so their constant whining about how hard their life is is pointless and does nothing but irritate me.” I let out a breath. Stalling tangent. “But you’re not most people. You’re not like _anybody_ else.”

I toyed with the handle of my chullo, feeling extremely incapable of making eye contact with him. “I didn’t realize what _this_ was until, like, two weeks ago. This whole time I thought you were just my best friend, but _just_ best friend never really felt right. Because about . . . a month ago, I think? I started having . . . weird dreams about you . . .”

I had to mentally prepare myself to expand on that, but Tweek actually beat me to it, and said quietly, “The --”

I nodded, understanding what he was trying to say before he had to actually say it. “Yeah, those dreams. Well, you thought they were nightmares, but they, uh . . . weren’t.” I felt my cheeks heat up. No they were fucking _not_. At the time, they felt like it, but they just kept getting better as soon as I accepted that I couldn’t control them. “They were . . .” My voice momentarily failed me, and I grunted irritably. “They were wet dreams, okay? I had probably a _thousand_ wet dreams about you and it scared the hell out of me, because it was the first time I’d ever thought of a guy like that, and I didn’t know what to do.”

Mostly without my permission, I chanced a glance at Tweek, and, in the split second that I allowed myself to look at him, I felt my heart pang at the baffled expression on his face. Gaping mouth, wide eyes, red cheeks. The same expression that seemed to take over his face periodically since he had burst through our dorm room door, under the impression that I was dying.

I cleared my throat and trudged onward in my confession. “And at first I tried to write it off like it didn’t mean anything, because for awhile I didn’t _want_ it to mean anything. I was so fucking sure I liked girls, even though I had never really liked _a_ girl before, because there was something so . . . unappealing about liking guys. I mean, I didn’t -- _don’t_ \-- care if someone is gay, but it was always something that someone _else_ was.” I let out a breath. “I get that it doesn’t make sense, but when I was growing up, my dad told me all the time that he didn’t have a problem with gay people, as long as they left him alone. That he didn’t give a shit either way, unless it was me or my sister. Before I started boxing, my dad asked me if I was gay, and when I told him no, he said he was _proud_ of me. That . . . really fucked with me, Tweek.

“But, I mean, like with pretty much everything else, I mostly didn’t care, so I never really thought it was a problem, but then I met _you_ , and . . .” I took a small step towards him and rubbed the back of my neck. “You’re _you_ , Tweek. You’re the only person I like, the only person I can picture myself being with. I _like_ you, Tweek.” My heart clanged at my own words, and I stared at my feet. “Fuck, I really, really fucking like you. More than Red Racer, more than any of the guinea pigs I ever had, more than my family, more than any of my friends, more than any person that’s ever existed. I . . . I want to date you. I want you to be my boyfriend, and I want to be your boyfriend.”

After the last word left my mouth, a blanket of the most unbearable silence that I’ve ever experienced covered the room. Forget a pin dropping, you would’ve been able to hear a termite cough. My heart was in my fucking throat, essentially clogging my air waves so that each breath that managed to make it to my lungs was sharp and rapid.

Fucking _finally_ Tweek’s voice, weak and shaky, managed out, “You . . .” before he fell silent again. Fuck, I wished he would’ve just said fucking _anything_ instead of just sitting there, staring at me. The tension was quickly leading my brain into insanity.

And then, when I was sure Tweek had fallen mute and was never going to be able to talk again, he shrieked, the sound actually making me jump for once, but I didn’t like how that sound fit in to the topic of conversation, and I had no desire to see whatever expression was on his face, so I kept my eyes fixed to the floor.

But then he said, his voice a little high-pitched and hopeful, “ _Oh, God!_ Really?”

I looked to him at his words and saw there was a hesitant, but not altogether displeased, expression on his face. He was staring at me, and doing that wide-eyed trust evaluation thing, and I gave him a shaky, broken smile. “Really, Tweek.”

There was another beat of silence, before his lips quirked and he narrowed his eyes at me. He clambered awkwardly to his feet, and then folded his arms over his chest, spitting out, “You _better_ not be fucking lying to me, man --”

My smile got a little stronger at that. “I’m not lying to you.”

Tweek let out such a long, deep breath, I somewhat expected him to deflate like one of those giant floating balloons at like the Macy’s Day Thanksgiving Parade bullshit thing that happens every year that no one cares about. And then after another few seconds of silence, Tweek let out a groan and said, “ _Jesus Christ_ , why didn’t you tell me before?!”

I raised an eyebrow at him. “Why didn’t _you_ tell me before?” I asked.

Tweek unfolded his arms and slouched his shoulders dramatically. “GAH! Because _you’re you_ and . . . oh, God, you’re _you_ , I don’t know! You’re my best friend, I couldn’t’ve just _told_ you!”

I shrugged. “You’re my best friend, I couldn’t’ve just told you. Tweek, you and I were in the exact same position; everything you’re saying, I can say right back to you. I get it.”

He huffed, giving me an unimpressed look that clearly read that the situation hadn’t sunk in completely yet. “Oh, man! This whole thing is stupid! We could’ve been dating for _longer_ than half a minute!”

I felt my stomach quiver at his words. That . . . he didn’t understand what he had just said, did he? He said it too casually for it to be normal; because that comment was anything _but_ normal, anything _but_ casual. It made my heart feel all . . . fluttery and shit, and a smile so wide crossed my face that it actually hurt my cheeks. “Dating?” I asked, trying to keep the excitement from sounding too obvious in my voice. “We’re dating?”

At my words, Tweek’s face turned pink, and his features softened as he smiled shyly at me. “NGH! Yeah, man . . . if you want --”

I grinned, nodding decidedly at him. “Fuck, yeah, I want that, Tweek. Just . . .” I let out a breathy laugh. “Fuck, I want that so bad.”

I instinctively, impulsively, reached out to him and wrapped my arms around him, pulling him into my chest. He was so warm -- how could a human being _possibly_ be that fucking warm? It was an enigma that I had no hope of solving. And when he wrapped his arms around my waist, nestling into me happily, that enigma wasn’t just pressed into my chest anymore, it was all around me. I buried my nose into Tweek’s hair, and breathed him in. And there -- coffee. Strong, rich, black coffee, liquid roasted coffee beans. Bitter as bitter can be be, but still so undeniably sweet.

 _That_ was home, right there. Just me and Tweek. And I was so happy to be back.

Before I could lose myself in the moment, Tweek lifted his head and said, his voice filled with awe and curiosity, “So if we’re dating, then that means we like each other.”

I smiled down at him. “That means we like each other.”

“GAH! In the _kissing_ way!”

I snorted, feeling my entire body relaxing into that comfortableness that Tweek’s presence always gave me. Because Tweek’s description of our mutual feelings for each other was probably the cutest thing I’d ever heard him say, and it brought me back to the days before all that shit with me being jealous and Tweek and I hiding things from each other happened. It was such a nice, warm feeling, doubled in size and intensity with the realization that my person thought I was their person, too. “That’s a weird way to put it, but yeah.”

“Does that mean we can kiss again?” he asked, his wide, curious eyes not leaving my face for a second.

I felt my cheeks heat up, but in the good way, and all nervousness that I’d been feeling -- which, granted, wasn’t a whole lot at that point -- wasted away at both the question, and his sincere, relaxed expression. “That would make me sooo happy.”

A slow smile spread across Tweek’s face, that eventually evolved into a full-blown grin, his eyes crinkled and his coffee teeth on full display. Usually he was so insecure about his smile -- he had slightly yellow teeth from all the coffee he drank -- and, even though I talk about it a lot, he actually didn’t do those big-toothy smiles very often. But whenever he did, it really stuck out in my mind, and, in that moment, he lit up the entire fucking room.

“Now?” he asked softly, pressing up on his toes and resting his forehead on my browline. Because he couldn’t reach my forehead without me leaning down.

“If you want,” I said quietly, adjusting our heads so that our eyes were level, and our lips were dangerously close.

“Then now,” Tweek said, smiling up at me, and closing the rest of distance, pressing his lips firmly onto mine.

If you were to tell the Craig from September 1st of 2017 that in four months time, he’d be making out with his roommate after declaring that he was in softcore-love with him, he would be so pissed, and he wouldn’t believe you. Because the Craig from September 1st of 2017 was a fucking moron and thought that he was 100% straight, instead of being mostly -- if not completely -- totally gay.

But fuck off if I wanted to be anywhere else besides in a pair of day-old sweatpants, in my college dorm room on the last day of exams, at one in the morning, with my arms wrapped around the cutest little shit in existence.

His lips were still trembling, but that was probably because it was our first actual mutual kiss, and he was also Tweek, and, as far as I knew, almost completely incapable of sitting still. Guess that translated to various features of his face. But he was doing the best he could, and damn, the best he could was pretty fucking good if you asked me.

Tweek’s hands -- which were originally clasped behind my neck, slowly undid and he slid his hands from my shoulders to my neck. Fuck, his hands were so soft, and there was something so familiar about what he was doing, like we’d been doing it for years. I mean, even in my dreams, Tweek liked caressing and holding my head and neck and shoulders, but I hadn’t been having those dreams long enough for it to become routine.

And then Tweek snuck his hands underneath my hat, curling his fingers into my hair and tugging sharply, and I sucked in a breath through my nose. There wasn’t an inch of me that was coherent and capable of thought, and I melted into him, completely letting go of every single one of my inhibitions.

With Tweek’s fascination with pulling my hair, and his impossibly warm body, _and_ the enthusiastic way his lips were dancing on mine, standing was starting to get a little hard. My head was swimming and my knees were shaky and I could tell Tweek was in pretty much the same state, judging by how heavily he was leaning into me. Carefully, I removed my lips from his, and urged him with me as I made my way to my bed, falling backwards onto the middle of it to give my shaking legs a break. Tweek collapsed onto my mattress next to me, but there was no hesitation on his part before he wrapped his arms around my neck and kissed me again.

Fuck, he was _broiling_ ; I chased the heat that was always radiating off of him, and grabbed the back of his thighs with my hands, lifting him up so that he slid comfortably into my lap. I was shocked at myself; it was like my body was moving on autopilot and just seeking whatever pleasure it could as fast as it could. Like a desperate, suddenly-sex-crazed monkey. The thought _did_ cross my mind that I was going too far without consulting Tweek about his boundaries yet, (I mean, the _last_ fucking thing I wanted to do was force myself on Tweek because my mind was elsewhere and I couldn’t help myself). And that thought made me nervous, and another -- sadder -- thought crossed my mind that I should probably stop and make sure it was okay for him to be in my lap _prior_ to doing whatever it was we were about to do, but before I could do any of that, Tweek shifted his legs so that his knees were locked on either side of my hips. His lips didn’t leave mine for a second, his hands sliding from my neck to my shoulders and back again, and I was really fucking relieved that he was coping just about as fine as I was.

 _Besides_ , I remember thinking, putting my hands on his lower waist and stroking the exposed skin where his shirt was riding up. Tweek was the kind of guy who would _immediately_ let you know if you did something he didn’t like, so I didn’t allow myself to worry about it, and instead lost myself in his lips and his warm body and his curious hands, both of which left sparks of heat wherever they went.

I slowly lowered my hands so that I was gripping his hips, and, when Tweek didn’t stop me, I felt a courage build inside me, and I lowered my hands ever more so that they were resting on top of his thighs. I didn’t dare move them -- I needed a fucking reaction before I started seriously groping him -- but all I got was a whiny demand of,

“GAH! _Craig_!” followed by Tweek bouncing a couple times, and yep.

I got the fucking hint.

I almost completely unraveled just at the brief friction Tweek caused -- but the message was received, and I guess that was all that mattered. My hands wandered all over the tops of his thighs, gently caressed his skin through his jeans. Underneath those jeans . . . there were thighs. And those thighs were _Tweek’s_ thighs. Tweek’s thighs that were probably pale and soft, like his stomach and neck, and _fuuuuck_. . .

I moaned into Tweek’s mouth, my hands tightening around both of his legs, my nails digging into him. Tweek shuddered, his hands slinking so far under my hat that he basically just pushed it right off of my head, and the rush of cool air that blew through my hair somehow sent a heat down my spine. It was the juxtaposition of Tweek’s warm body against mine, and the cooler temperature of the room; that was what got me. And _fuck_ did it get me.

The little squeaks and moans that Tweek was giving as a response to my groping gave me another burst of courage, and I slid my hands just a little _lower_ , so that I was cupping his jean-clad ass. (God _dammit_ , I wanted those jeans out of the way.) Tweek gasped sharply, arched his back, and ground his hips into me. I sucked in a breath, feeling a spark of heat shoot straight to where our hips met.

Tweek pulled away from the kiss, the tips of our lips brushing together, and he let out a moan so loud, and so insistent, that it shot down my body and made my dick twitch excitedly. My eyes fluttered open, (because, as fucking amazing as I was physically feeling, I wanted to see Tweek’s face, too), and my breath was taken away by the expression I was met with; his lips were parted, red and raw and well-used, his cheeks were pink, his eyes hooded and his gaze filled with a lust I didn’t think he was capable of harboring.

But I didn’t really have the chance to revel in the expression on his face, because Tweek leaned down and pecked my lips once, twice, three times, none of them lasting long enough for me to reciprocate. I was about to just grab his face and kiss him the right way, but Tweek turned his face away, and started pulling at my sweatshirt. I mean, he’d already been toying around with my sweatshirt before, clinging to it and yanking it this way and that, but that time he was pulling it _upwards_ , like he was trying to get me to take it off.

I shivered nervously and excitedly at the thought.

I pulled back from him, giving myself just enough room to grab the back of my sweatshirt and pull it up and over my head, exposing my black NASA t-shirt, (I had about seven NASA t-shirts, because they’re cheap and I like them so leave me the fuck alone about it). Tweek eyed me as I threw the sweatshirt somewhere across the room -- really anywhere that wasn’t on my bed -- and as soon as my full attention was back on him, he grabbed my cheeks and pulled me back into another kiss.

Like I figured the next step should’ve been, I slid my hands up his chest and started toying with the buttons of his shirt. I pulled back just enough to mumble against his lips, “Can I?”

Tweek nodded hurriedly, sticking his chest out so that I had ample room to work with. I set my fingers to the task of undressing Tweek immediately; I felt, in that moment, very happy that I had such long, skinny fingers, because it meant that the unbuttoning of the buttons went by much faster. But, to pass the time, I nuzzled Tweek’s jawline with my nose, and started placing soft kisses and gentle nips on his skin. His breathing got heavier and less even, and he tilted his head so that even more of his neck was available for my leisure.

Because Tweek had skipped a few buttons, it took less time to take off than it could’ve, and, when the front of his shirt was wide open, I slipped my fingers around his shoulders and peeled the long-sleeved shirt off his arms. I guess the cold air got to him, because he shivered but eagerly helped me undress him anyway, shaking the sleeves almost violently to get it off.

When it fell to the floor with a distinct ‘fwoomp’ noise, I tried to kiss him again, but he hid his face away, and grabbed the hem of my t-shirt. I took the hint immediately, and rid myself of that layer, too, so that both of our chests were bare and pressed flush together.

I sighed contentedly at the feeling, but I didn’t have much time to sit and bask, because Tweek wrapped his arms around my neck and kissed me again, only that time, he snuck his tongue into my already-open, unsuspecting mouth. My eyes widened, but, as if Tweek sensed that I was about to -- involuntarily -- shirk away from him, he kept me close, and used his tongue to massage mine. I had never really thought about french kissing anyone before; theoretically, it’s absolutely gross, to have someone’s boneless appendage just writhing around in your mouth. But fuck ‘theoretically’, because Tweek’s mouth was warm, and wet, and tasted like his favorite brand of dark chocolate and -- understandably -- coffee. But it wasn’t like the coffee that had me barfing my brains out when I was thirteen; this coffee was _delicious_. I melted into him, trying to kiss him back as best as I could. It didn’t feel like I was doing a good job, but Tweek seemed to have appreciated it, if his moans and shivers that I was rewarded with said anything.

I couldn’t pinpoint when it started, but at some point around there, my hips had somehow found a slow rhythm against Tweek’s hips. He met my shallow pelvic-rolls with surprising adeptness, his back arching like a cat whenever he thrust forward. And, I mean it was innocent enough at first, but the dry-humping got more and more intense the more we did it, and the deeper our kisses got. And, as great as Tweek straddling my lap was, I didn’t really have the angle that I wanted, so I wrapped an arm tightly around his waist, cupped the back of his head, braced my legs, and flipped us so that he was laying underneath me, his head on my pillow. Tweek fumbled slightly, breaking the kiss in surprise at his sudden change in position, but he adjusted quickly enough, grabbing hold of my head, tugging me with him. He held me so close I was pretty much laying on top of him, his knees locking around my waist so that I couldn’t move even if I wanted to.

He was shaking underneath me. He was nervous. I was nervous. Which was actually a good thing, because then we could at least be nervous together. I think it was safe to assume that Tweek wasn’t exactly skilled in what we were doing, and _I_ definitely fucking wasn’t; I was just kind of going off of what felt right, and what Tweek responded well to. And it seemed to be working out just fine, if the soft moans that Tweek was transferring from his mouth to mine said anything.

I caressed his warm waist, and moved my lips from his mouth to his neck, and, when he whimpered quietly, I said to him, my voice a mumble on his pressure point, “I missed you.” When Tweek just let out a shaky breath, I started to suck harsh enough at the skin so that I knew there was going to be a fairly noticeable bruise there.

I know a lot of people give hickeys to ‘lay claim’ to whoever they were making out with, but, for me, it wasn’t like that. I didn’t want to _claim_ him; that’s fucking creepy as hell, and doesn’t even sound right to even think about. It was definitely not about claiming him, but more like . . . Tweek seemed to like having my lips on his neck, I knew that -- generally speaking -- sucking on someone’s pressure point was supposed to feel really good, and, to be honest, I thought it was hot as fucking hell to nibble on his skin like that.

Which sounds even creepier than I intend it to, but . . . whatever. Tweek didn’t seem to be complaining, so I let it be. And his ‘not complaining’ was only emphasized when he moaned, “ _Mmm_. . . more, Craig . . .”

His voice made my entire body short-circuit, and, despite the fact that I was wearing sweats, my pants got unbearably tight. “Actually just . . . hang on a second,” I said, pulling away from him and clambering awkwardly off of my bed. Tweek verbally protested, (and _physically_ protested, he tried to grab my arms to get me to stop), but I shook my head and said, “I’d feel much better if I wasn’t wearing sweatpants right now.”

And, judging by Tweek’s pink cheeks, I think he got where I was coming from and let me undress. My fingers were still shaking some -- I was so. Fucking. Nervous. And it was hard to keep myself still -- but I managed to get the waistband of my sweatpants off of my hips, and kick them off of my feet in less than five seconds.

I looked up when I heard the rustle of my mattress, and I instantly caught sight of Tweek, his hand on the fly of his jeans. He looked up at me and held my gaze as he removed his pants, that same look of irreversible lust in his eyes. My dick twitched delightfully at the view; there was a weird sensualness in the way he undressed himself, like he knew what he was doing to me and was doing it on purpose. Which was probably the case, because Tweek was a little shit sometimes. Not that I minded in that moment, because he was doing nothing but making my entire body feel really, really fucking good. Bottom line: he was hot, and I was weak.

Tweek kicked his jeans off of my bed when they were completely off and then settled back on my mattress comfortably. Well, comfortable for him; just looking at him made my boner get somehow even harder: Tweek was reclining back on his elbows, his head balanced above my pillow, and he had his feet propping his knees up so he was kind of in the crab-walk position, just with his ass on the bed instead of in the air. His legs were spread open, and the look in his eyes said that, yes, they were open for the reason I’d hoped they were going to be open for.

I stumbled back onto my bed and found my allocated place between his legs, jolting when Tweek immediately wrapped them around my waist and pulled me into him. I took a few deep breaths, closing my eyes, and tried to get used to the feeling of his thin-clothed length against mine -- and by _get used to_ , I mean try not to freak the fuck out, because God _damn_ did it feel good.

I opened my eyes, caught his gaze, (which was hooded with anticipation and nervousness), and I -- without looking away from his beautiful hazel eyes -- I slowly ground my hips down into his. Tweek shuddered, and breathed, “Oh, _Jesus_!”

I was slightly afraid of how easily he could take my breath away.

I gripped Tweek’s jaw between my thumb and the rest of my fingers, aligned our mouths, and pressed my lips harshly against his. He quickly kissed me back, his arms wrapping around my neck. Every inch of him was perfect; the way he squirmed at my touch, the way his lips trembled when my fingers tightened around his jutting hip bone, the way his own slender fingers found their way to my hair, and tugged, it made my heart feel a little lighter. I mean, I would’ve told him I loved him, right then and there, if my mind wasn’t so preoccupied with trying to make him feel as much pleasure as humanly possible. He fucking deserved it.

My hand on his hip bone clamped down, and I pulled his hips up into mine. I couldn’t have held back the moan if I wanted to; the friction was so fucking amazing, made even better when Tweek gasped loudly. At first, though, the sound made me nervous; I thought I’d hurt him, because it wasn’t like any of the other breaths he’d made that night. It was more . . . intense and attention-grabbing. But, before I could back out of my own actions, he moaned, “NGH! _Craig_!” his back arching into me eagerly, and his legs widening, so I took this as a good thing, and I continued what I was doing. I -- without mercy, directed towards him or me --  began to grind him into my mattress. Tweek’s head flew back against my pillow, and I lowered my head, resuming biting and licking the warm, pulsating skin of his neck.

You know, none of my dreams really got Tweek’s behavior in bed quite right; sometimes he was wild and insatiable, other times he was a shy virgin that didn’t understand what sex was, and then -- though it was rare -- Tweek and I had this unbreakable wavelength that meant no words were even necessary. But that Tweek -- the one writhing beneath me, was nothing more than just _Tweek in bed_. It was nothing special, while also being _everything_ special. He was slightly demanding and all of his movements and words would’ve appeared exaggerated had he been anyone else. But Tweek always threw everything he had into everything he did, and it was very obvious by the way he was reacting.

I grew more confident the more I watched his face twist and his chest heave deep, rapid breaths, and started to grind myself into him faster. Like I expected -- and like every single one of my dreams got right -- he was very vocal, mumbling “Fuck, man,”’s and “Sweet Jesus,”’ and “Oh, God”’s every few seconds as his hands ran down his face and through his hair and clutched at my bed sheets.

If I’m being brutally fucking honest, I was probably louder than either of us expected, groaning whenever his hips jerked out of tune with the steady rhythm we had found.

Through Tweek’s barely-understandable utterances, I caught him whine, “Kiss me,” as he reached for my hair and tugged my face down to him. I had absolutely no problem with this demand, and met his tongue halfway. Neither of us were really coherent enough to kiss properly, and we were basically just slobbering clusmily all over each other’s faces, but that was a-o-fucking-kay with me.

This simple routine continued on for a couple minutes after it began, but, because Tweek and I had never had any sexual encounters before that night, and we were very much virgins, (more desperate than I originally thought I was), the edge for both of us was rapidly approaching. I tried to hold off for as long as possible, but, when Tweek’s legs tightened around me, and his breathing turned into more desperate pants, (the breaths blowing onto my parted lips and my cheeks, and I’m we _all_ fucking know how I feel about warm breathing close to my face), his moans getting louder, it was getting much more difficult to delay.

Tweek pulled his lips off of mine, (even though we were hardly kissing at that point), and he mumbled breathlessly, “Oh, Craig, I --”

I understood exactly what he was trying to say, because the gathering of heat and pressure where our hips met was getting to be too much for me, too. “Jesus, Tweek . . .” I panted, “me, too . . .”

Tweek’s breathing was more labored, to the point that he was breathing so fast he was almost not even breathing anymore. If that makes any sense. “Faster, Craig, I’m so close --”

I groaned, picking up the pace even more, despite the fact that my legs were burning, and my lungs were burning, and, had my desperation for release not been as . . . _desperate_ as it was, I probably would’ve stopped. But I could feel it, I could fucking feel it, and then --

“Oh, fuck . . . _fuck_. . .”

I felt my orgasm rip through my body, and I groaned, my eyes rolling into the back of my head, as I jerkily thrust my hips along with his, absently feeling my come dampening my boxers. But I was determined to get him off before my dick got too sensitive to continue what we were doing.

And, probably a second after I came, Tweek screeched, his legs tightening around me, and his arms clenching around my neck, and he called out, “Oh, Jesus, _Craig_!” And, even though I was a little, (or, more accurately, a lot), out of commission, I felt Tweek’s come dampening his boxers, and it _kind of_ registered in my mind. But, thinking about it now, it should’ve been more important than I thought it was at the time. Because, not only was it my first sexual encounter, but it was with a _guy_ , and we were rubbing _dicks_ together, and I loved him so much that it made my chest hurt.

If you were to tell Thomas Tucker that his only son -- the heir to the Tucker name -- was undeniably gay, a total fruitcake, and over the moon and to the furthest star in space, (which is impossible, considering space is infinite), for Tweek Tweak . . .

Well, I wasn’t entirely sure how he’d take it. Probably not very well.

But I didn’t want to think about that then.

Not then.

Because I had my Tweek. And I was still reeling.

As I was coming down from my Tweek-induced high, I rolled off of him -- careful that I didn’t press down on his knee -- so that I wouldn’t suffocate him with the dead-weight of my spent body. I dropped my head back onto my pillow and took slow, deep breaths to try to calm myself down. My heart was pounding so fast, I could practically feel it beating against my ribcage, and I couldn’t get my breath fast enough. I could hear Tweek’s heavy puffs of air next to me.

After I felt I could breath relatively normally, I turned my head to look at him, and I instantly caught his gaze, which had already been locked on my face. We just stared at each other for a few seconds, our breathing steadying into a mutual rhythm, before I started to smile. Rather than question my sudden happiness, he smiled back at me, and soon we were laughing so hard my stomach ached and my cheeks felt ready to burst.  

It was gut-busting. My face hadn’t smiled that hard in a long, long time. It was almost painful, and I couldn’t even keep my eyes open, but the moment was so . . . I couldn’t even fucking believe it. I can honestly say that, before that night, I had never seen him smile so wide. He was radiating pure happiness. Think about the happiest thing you can think of -- what you think is the epitome of joy -- and then just replace it with the sight of Tweek Tweak laughing.

God, just . . . he was just so . . . just so fucking _Tweek_ , I couldn’t even handle it.

“You have no idea how many dreams I’ve had about that,” he said happily.

“Had about what?” I asked.

“Just . . . everything we just did, _all_ of that . . .”

I turned on my side to face him, with the intent to pull him into my chest, and he mimicked me. But, as much as I wanted to hold him and lay there forever, the second I moved, I finally felt the stickiness between my legs, and I grimaced, pulling away and sitting up. I was sticky with sweat, but I was willing to ignore _that_ part, because I wasn’t really in the mood to shower. But I _did_ want to get out of my soiled underwear, and, by the way Tweek started squirming and groaning, I figured he felt the same.

“I feel gross,” I said, awkwardly climbing to my feet.

Tweek followed after me, staring down at his crotch once he was standing and saying, “ERGH! Me, too. Thank Jesus I left some underpants here. I wasn’t fucking joking, man, I only have one pair left at Kenny’s.”

I smirked, shaking my head. I still didn’t entirely believe him about the “Underpants Gnomes”, but I was willing to go along with it. Because, as much as I didn’t want to admit it, they probably _were_ real. Because Tweek was weird, and I was contemplating the idea that he actually was born in South Park and just moved away before any of us were sentient enough to know, or remember him. And it makes sense that I was drawn to him, and he was drawn to me, and the universe put us together the way it did; I’m a fucking _South Park_ kid, and I can’t seem to escape that.

I shucked my boxers off, wiping myself clean, and tossed them on the top of my dirty clothes pile. With all the shit that’d been happening, I’d been getting kind of behind on my laundry, which was weird, because usually I was on top of my laundry. I loved doing laundry; it was therapeutic, for some reason, even if there wasn’t anything wrong.

I was about to grab another pair to wear, when Tweek suddenly squealed, and his shrill voice exclaimed,

“GAH! YOU’RE _NAKED_!”

I looked over to him, and saw that he had clapped two hands to his eyes, like he had always done when one of us got dressed/undressed.

“Fucking _warn_ me next time, man!”

I laughed, ignoring the heat in my cheeks in favor of appreciating how flustered he was. I grabbed a clean pair of underwear from the top drawer at the end of my bed, slipped them on, and turned to face him again. He was shaking, two hands clasped it front of both eyes, a nervous grimace on his lips. “Tweek, would you like a recap of what just happened? Because I’d be glad to give you one. Sure, we weren’t naked, but we might as well have been, the way we were --”

“NGH! Okay, I _get_ it, Craig!” Tweek exclaimed, peeking between his fingers at me.

“I never said I was dressed yet,” I said, smirking at his blushing face. “You’re a total pervert, you know that?”

Tweek groaned, dropping his arms and glaring at me. “Can you turn around so _I_ can get changed? I don’t trust you at all.”

I knew he was just joking -- or, well not _joking_ , but he wasn’t _serious_ \-- but it was still a badly-timed jab. I raised an eyebrow at him, trying to wordlessly inform him that maybe later I’d be able to handle that sort of bullshit teasing, but not then, not, like half an hour after we finally made up after the most stressful two weeks of my life.

Tweek’s face relaxed, his cheeks turning pink. “I mean, I _do_ trust you,” he said awkwardly, clawing at his chest, like he’d forgotten he wasn’t wearing a shirt. “Just . . . you’re kind of a pervert, too.”

I rolled my eyes, and turned around, folding my arms over my chest. “Okay, you can have your privacy. I won’t peek, I promise. Unlike somebody _else_ I know --”

“GAH! Oh, _Jesus_ , I’m going to regret this whole relationship thing, aren’t I?” Tweek said, but there was a smile in his voice, and it made me smile, too.

“Probably. But hopefully not for awhile.”

Tweek did his little giggle-laugh, but didn’t say anything. I heard some rustling of clothes, the opening of a drawer, the closing of a drawer, and then some more rustling of clothes. And then Tweek said, “Okay, I’m done, you can look now.”

When I turned around, Tweek was still shirtless -- which I hadn’t expected -- and was wearing a pair of green fleece pajama pants. His hair was sticking up all over the place, only it was worse because of the fact that his head just repeatedly rubbed against my pillow.

The sum up those two sentences: he looked really, really fucking cute, and my heart melted at the sight of him.

Tweek walked towards me, a sheepish smile on his face, and he stood up on his toes, running his fingers through my hair. “I like your hair,” he said offhandedly, almost like he didn’t even realize he was talking out loud. I smiled and bowed my head for him, sighing happily and, watching his content face as his hands worked through my tangled, thick hair. The last time my hair had seen anything other than the inside of my hat was when I last took a shower. It was a little greasy, because of the extremely fun physical exertion that I had just experienced, but I figured Tweek probably wouldn’t care. And, besides, he could shower with me in the morning.

Wait --

 _Different stalls_ , though! He wasn’t going to shower _with me_ with me; I didn’t think we were ready to do that together, not one day into a relationship.

We stood there for a bit, before Tweek asked calmly, his eyes lowering to meet my gaze, “Are you going to sleep in your underwear? You’ve never done that before.”

“Well we weren’t dating before. And I’m really hot right now, and I, uh . . .” I shrugged, turning my face away, making his hands fall to his sides. I was blushing, and, I didn’t want him to see. “Well, I kind of want to . . . you know . . .”

The look on Tweek’s face told me that he didn’t, in fact, know.

I furrowed my eyebrows. “I want to cuddle, okay? I missed you, and I want to cuddle, and your body is, like, always really hot. Is that okay with you?” My voice had a slight edge to it, but I was embarrassed that he didn’t understand and that I had to say it out loud.

Tweek blushed, and nodded, turning his face away. But not before I caught the small smile on his face. “That’s okay with me. I never really took you for the type, though --”

“I never took me for the type, either,” I said shrugging, walking over to my bed and lifting up the covers so that we could lay down comfortably. “But I also didn’t take me for the gay type, and you can see how that turned out.”

“Being gay isn’t so bad,” Tweek said, smiling at me. “When you’re around the right people.”

My heart and face smiled at his words. “Yeah. And you’re the right person.”

He did his little giggle-laugh, and I made a mental note to tell him that I thought it was cute as fuck when we were deeper than an hour into our relationship. “You’re the right person, too.”

I had Tweek climb under the covers first, so that he was laying on the wall side. It wasn’t because I was being a gentleman, like, _after you, you adorable asshole_ , or anything like that, but I just wanted him on the wall side. I mean, I don’t know, I just felt safer with him against the wall. Call me overprotective, but I liked having something on either side of him, and I liked being his barrier in case someone broke into our dorm room. Which was definitely not going to happen, (or, there was like, a 0.001% chance of it happening), but it was the thought anyway. And Tweek wasn’t complaining, so I figured it was okay.

I climbed in after him, letting the blanket rest around our chests, and I reached an arm out and wrapped it around his waist, pulling him closer to me. He took the hint, shifting closer to me and resting his forehead against mine. He stared at me, almost unblinkingly, with his big, hazel eyes, that were _shining_ and glistening in the dim lamp light.

Fuck, I could’ve lost myself in his eyes for forever.

After a few moments of comfortable silence, Tweek said, his voice quiet and his eyes full of warmth, “Thank you, Craig.”

My smile slipped a bit, and my eyebrows furrowed in confusion. I didn’t think I deserved any gratitude for anything. I was just happy he was even _smiling_ at me. I was happy he was talking to me, I was happy he didn’t actually hate me, I was happy he liked me back enough to date me.

“For what?” I asked in the same hushed tone that he used.

“For . . . everything,” he answered. “For not leaving when you first realized I’m a total spaz, for watching Red Racer with me, for walking me to classes and beating those guys up, for being my best friend, for . . . _everything_. You . . . you don’t know how much it means to me.”

I smiled at him and drew circles on his waist with my thumb. “You’re my favorite person, Tweek, of course I did all that for you.”

“Can I tell you something?” he asked, his smile widening when I immediately nodded.

“You can tell me anything,” I said quickly. Because I knew that, part of the reason this whole thing had happened was because Tweek was trying to keep something from me, and I needed him to know that I had, not just one ear, but both of my ears at the ready for whenever he needed them.

“That whole thing from earlier, the time limit? Five minutes or I never have to talk to you again?” He waited for me to nod before continuing. “That was total bullshit. You could’ve taken an hour, I wasn’t going to leave this room for anything tonight.”

I laughed happily, even though I didn’t really know if that was meant to make me happy. “Tweek, you almost gave me a heart attack with that!”

He did his little giggle-laugh. “I didn’t mean to! I just thought it’d probably make you talk faster. And skip the whole apology part.” His smile faltered for a second, and he averted his eyes, shifting even closer to me and putting a hand to my chest. “And . . . can I tell you something else?”

This seemed much more serious, so I took it as that, and nodded. “You can tell me anything,” I said quietly, drawing circles on his back comfortingly.

“I’m sorry it took me thinking you were dying for me to come see you,” he said hesitantly, gnawing on his bottom lip. “You know I kind of . . . knew you were doing bad, but . . . I was doing bad, too, and part of me felt good about the whole thing. Like . . . if my life was falling to shit because of you, then your life deserved to fall to shit because of me.”

I understood where he was coming from, I did, but it hurt to hear, anyway.

“But that’s stupid,” he continued, shaking his head, causing my head to move with him. “Because just because one person hurts doesn’t mean somebody else has to. It just . . . it would’ve made me feel worse if I knew you were doing good, because then it meant you would’ve been able to live happy without me, and there is no _way_ I would’ve ever been happy again if we stopped talking for good, and then I _hit_ you, and all that shit I said about you being a terrible person and me hating you and it was _all a lie,_ and -- _oh God!_ \-- and I’m _sorry_ , Craig, _Jesus Christ_ \--”

Before he could ramble on anymore, I grabbed his chin with my free hand, adjusted his mouth so that it aligned perfectly with mine, and I kissed him. He mumbled more words against my lips, but I soothed him to soft whimpers, stroking his back and moving my other hand to his cheek, carressing the smooth skin until he was as calm as he had been before.

I pulled back after a few more seconds, and gave him a smile. “There is absolutely no way I would be able to cope without you. You’re my Tweek, and nobody else can ever be my Tweek.”

Tweek’s eyes were wide as his gaze flicked from my right eye to my life. Jesus, there must’ve been . . . meth or something in his eyes, because I couldn’t stop looking at them.

“I’m sorry, Craig,” he said, his voice heartbreakingly broken.

I stroked his cheek with my thumb, and tried to keep my smile confident for him. I was okay -- fucking _amazing_ \-- and I needed him to see that. That us making up was the highlight of probably my entire life, rivaled only by the day we met. “I’m sorry, too, Tweek. Can we forget it ever happened?”

“As long as you don’t pull a full blown asshole again,” he said, a smile tugging at the corners of his lips.

“And as long as _you_ promise never to hit me again, Jesus, it’s like you have iron in your knuckles,” I said. I meant it as a joke, but Tweek’s face fell, and there was an apology lurking behind his eyes. I sighed. I knew he felt bad, but I didn’t want him to anymore; everything had been fixed. I’d forgiven him, and he’d forgiven me, and I was going to get him to fucking smile goddammit.

“I’m going to try my fucking hardest to make sure that this doesn’t ever happen again,” I said firmly while also trying to maintain my soothing tone. “We both said and did some pretty dumb shit, but it’s in the past. Like I said before, and like I’ll probably end up saying a lot in the near and distant future, you’re still my Tweek. And I, uh . . . lo--” The word died on my lips, but I brushed my fingers through his hair to distract him from my falter and corrected, “I like you a lot. Even if you’re an asshole. So don’t worry, okay? You don’t ever have to worry.”

There was a short pause before Tweek’s brilliantly romantic response tumbled out of his unconfident mouth. “I . . . I don’t want to be dependent on you.”

I grinned despite myself. “I don’t want that, either. And I’m sorry for turning into a total bitch whenever you made plans with someone else, but, ironically enough, _I_ got dependent on _you_.”

Tweek nuzzled into me and inhaled. “I don’t want that.”

“I don’t want that either.”

“It hurts.”

“It hurts like a bitch.”

There was a lull of silence.

Tweek cleared his throat, the hand that was still resting on my chest sliding up to my neck and he ran his fingers through the hair at the back of my head. “So how do we . . . not?”

That was a simple question with, what I considered to be, a simple answer. “We start hanging out with other people. We don’t hole ourselves up in here and avoid the world.”

“But I _like_ avoiding the world with you.”

“I like avoiding the world with you, too, and we can still avoid the world when we need to, but it can’t be all the time anymore. Relying on each other so much was part of the problem.” It hurt to say, but it was the truth. And it looked like Tweek realized this, too, even if he quirked his lips and looked away.

“And we can’t keep secrets from each other anymore,” I added offhandedly. “That was part of the problem, too.”

Tweek winced. “I . . . I’m sorry about that, too. I was just so scared to tell you, and --”

I hushed him with a kiss on to his forehead. “Stop apologizing, Tweek. Or I’ll kick you out of bed.”

He let out a breath and did a smaller, more hesitant version of his little giggle-laugh. “Okay.”

“You know, it’s funny. You feel bad because you were keeping a secret from me, but I was keeping a secret from you, too.”

“Well, yeah, but mine was _way_ worse than yours,” Tweek said, chewing absently on his bottom lip and averting his eyes.

“I doubt that. Mine was probably worse, actually.”

“No, Craig, it _really_ wasn’t.”

I took a long, deep breath, and said, before I could stop myself, “Listen, Tweek, you just have a crush on me, _I_ actually --” Before the word ‘love’ could even leave my mouth, my own words caught up with me and my jaws snapped shut. Because that word made me realize something. Something about the secret of Tweek’s that I’d been obsessing over. It wasn’t that Tweek had a _crush_ on someone. He was _in love_ with someone. And if I was under the impression that he had a crush on me, then chances were he wouldn’t be in love with someone else, because that’d be stupid, and Tweek wasn’t stupid. So that meant . . .

“Holy shit, you’re in love with me!” I exclaimed without thinking. (Read as: _like a fucking moron_.)

Tweek shrieked, pushing against my chest and squeezing his eyes shut and his lips quirking in his obvious embarrassment. “No, I didn’t say that! GAH! That’s not what happened, it isn’t --” His face was scarlet, and for a few, unbearable seconds, I watched him grapple with the shitty position that my stupid mouth had put him in.

Before he could continue on his tirade trying to deny a conversation we both knew he had, I cleared my throat and said in a blank voice, “That _is_ what happened, I heard it, but that doesn’t make any sense.” Because, of all the things Tweek and I had been through, and all the shit I had put him through, I didn’t really feel like I deserved it.

I guess Tweek wasn’t expecting my response, because his eyes flicked open and he glanced at me, before staring at some place around my neck. “What doesn’t make sense?”

“You . . . _loving_ me,” I said, pulling a face. “It doesn’t make any sense.”

Tweek furrowed his eyebrows, still avoiding my stare. “I think it makes sense.”

I didn’t have anything to say that, so I waited for him to elaborate. There was clearly something else he wanted to say; he had the anxious face of someone who was hoarding words on the tip of his tongue and was trying to bring up the courage to just open his mouth and let it spill out.

And then finally, Tweek said, his voice just above a whisper. “Craig . . . Craig, I . . .” He moved his head so that it was no longer pressed against mine, but he buried it in the crook of my neck. “I love you -- oh, _God_! And you don’t have to love me back, but I just --”

I put a hand to his cheek and, (for probably the millionth time that night), shifted his head so that he was almost forced to look at me again. I tried to smile at his shaky and vulnerable eyes, but I fucking hated that expression on him, and wanted it to fucking go away. I kissed him on the forehead and said, “Relax, Tweek. I believe you. And I don’t know when you’ll hear it again, because I’m not good at this kind of shit, but I love you, too.”

Tweek hesitated. “You do?”

I smiled and nodded. “I do.”

The start of a smile tugged at his lips. “A lot?”

“You have no idea.”

Finally, Tweek seemed to have calmed down, and he did his little giggle-laugh, nestling his body into mine. “Good. That’s good.”

We laid there for a moment, quietly. My heart fluttered nicely whenever I focused in on how warm he was, or how soft he was, or how warm the admiration in his eyes was, or how unbelievably _still_ he was. And then, at one point, Tweek took to dragging one of his hands lazily across my chest, and it was in that moment that I realized my heart didn’t stand a fucking chance.

I let myself bask in the moment. Because it was our last day before holiday break, and I wouldn’t get to touch him, or see him in person, for two and a half fucking weeks. But I didn’t want to think about that. It was going to suck and, if I could take him with me, I totally fucking would. Because not only would we not have to say goodbye, but he’d get to escape his asshole parents.  

He still hadn’t really talked about them much, but, from what little he had mentioned, I knew that I hated them.

The prolonged silence was only broken when Tweek let out a monstrous yawn, his head moving away from me so he could let it consume his entire body. And so the theoretical thirty minute countdown began.

He smacked his lips a few times before looking up at me, his eyes starting to droop. “I’m tired,” he announced, nuzzling close to me, and letting his eyes slide closed.

I smiled at him, even though I knew he couldn’t see me. God fucking dammit, he was so cute, it almost hurt. I pulled away from him, only to turn the lamp on my bedside table off. I pulled him back into me and said, “Then let’s go to sleep.”

I watched Tweek’s face as it relaxed slowly, his breathing falling into a soothing, even rhythm. And, only after I was _sure_ he was sleeping, (which took only a couple minutes), I gave him a slow, soft kiss on the forehead, losing myself in the forever-coffee scent that seemed embedded in his hair and skin and _aura_. I missed it so fucking much. I missed _him_ so fucking much.

“I love you, Tweek,” I mumbled tiredly, closing my eyes and adjusting my arms around his body. “More than fucking anything. Don’t you ever forget that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am EXTREMELY interested to hear what you guys have to say about this chapter!! So please comment and let me know if you liked it or not!
> 
> It's the first time that I've had a chapter this long that's been only one scene, and that's one of the things I'm most worried about. At least with other chapters, it was broken up by when they went to sleep/class, etc. But here it just runs straight through, so I'm curious as to how well that went over. There's also quite a bit of fluff, to the point where I'm worried it's a little out of character? Just let me know, so I can adjust future chapters as needed. 
> 
> And, I'm sure it translated, but I'm not experienced with much of THAT nature, so that's why parts of it come across weird. I tried to make it as believable as possible, though.
> 
> Okay, enough of that! Thank you so much for reading and making it this far!


	21. Tiffany Just Called Regina Fat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so so sorry about the wait! I hope it was worth it?
> 
> Anyway, I hope you like it!

So dumbass me forgot to turn my school alarm off the night before, so, at 9:00, that loud chiming noise, paired with the loud vibration-y sound that happens when a phone is resting on wood, erupted in the room. I jolted, my body automatically reaching out to turn my alarm off. I guess something about my alarm that morning scared me more than it usually did, but, after a few breaths, I remembered that I _was_ in Nebraska, at a college with no particular affiliation with anything bad, in a dorm room on the third floor. Like I’d been for an entire semester, so not in immediate danger. I let out a breath and relaxed, but, before I could sink back into my bed, I then also realized that there was something heavy next to me, making a small dip in the mattress, and I glanced down.

A warmth immediately spread through my chest.

Tweek.

He was still sleeping, facing away from me with his arms sprawled in front of him and his chest rising and falling slowly. His blonde hair was splayed all around him, soft looking even in it’s disheveled glory. He was shirtless -- a fact that I found very, very satisfying -- with the blanket pooled around his waist, probably having slid down when I sat up.

I smiled. If I thought that watching him from afar as he slept, (which I didn’t do with the intention to be creepy, but would likely deny if anybody were to ask me about it), was mesmerizing, then I was taken out of commission by how . . . you know, I’m gonna fucking say it, _angelic_ he looked up close. I leaned over him so I could see his face more clearly, and my heart quivered when his nose twitched and his lips quirked.

I compulsively placed my hand on his exposed waist, my fingers resting gently on the edge of his stomach. He was impossibly warm, like always, his pale skin a stark contrast against my dark blue blanket. He seized up, his arms drawing back and pressing against his chest, but his muscles relaxed almost immediately when I hummed and started to stroke his skin with my thumb.  

Did I feel awkward that, after believing I was straight for so many years, my first official relationship was with another guy? And not only was it _just_ a relationship with another guy, but it was _the_ relationship with another guy? I was only aware of my homosexuality for not even a month, and I was somehow in a gay relationship; did that make my forward behavior awkward? Should I have been uncomfortable and hesitant?

I mean, I didn’t think so. Once I got over the stigma of being gay, and the weird, almost-homophobia instilled in me by my dad, being gay turned into pretty much everything else in my life: something to accept and not care about. And the scare of losing Tweek was still sharp in my mind, and I was not willing to let some awkwardness get in my way, not when Tweek and I were finally together.

You know, I guess, from an outsider’s perspective, Tweek and I must’ve looked like an extremely weird couple. I was a million feet tall, dark-haired, emotionless, and could care less about everything. And then Tweek was a million feet short, blonde-haired, so full of emotions they seemed to possess his entire body to the point where he had no voluntary physiological functions anymore, and almost cared about everything _too_ much. But there was one thing that brought us together, and it was something I’ll be forever grateful for:

90’s children’s television shows.

And I guess indirectly my mom. Had she not brought me my Red Racer DVDs, and gotten me a new TV, then Tweek and I never would’ve connected so quickly, and I would’ve still been under the impression that I was straight.

Fuck, man. I seriously have _no_ clue how it took me so long to realize the joys of dick. Tweek had the right idea.

My arm was starting to get tired from my over-extending it, so I carefully lowered myself onto my elbow, running my hand up and down Tweek’s side. He was so fucking adorable. He was _so fucking adorable_. His skin was soft, his eyes were big and expressive, his lips were . . . good, his nose twitched like a bunny when he slept, and that's not fucking all: Tweek made me care about him. I don't know if he worked some voodoo magic on me or something, but he made me a better person. He was so amazing, I loved him so much, and this guy that I thought was so fucking awesome . . . loved _me_. My heart fluttered at the very thought, and I grinned at his sleeping face, and, in order to contain any weird, lovesick guffaw noises, I pressed my face gently into the crook of his neck, which just made him giggle absently and nuzzle back into me. It was so fucking domestic, tooth-rotting fluff, but I couldn’t wipe the smile off my face even if I wanted to. Which I didn’t, because I never expected to make it that far with Tweek. As soon as I realized I loved him, he was gone. I never thought I’d, not only make it into bed with him, but also score myself a love confession, too.

As much fun as just laying next to the unconscious Tweek was, I only had so much time with him that day before he had to go back to Colorado, and I wanted to spend some of that with him still being awake. So I slid my hand from his waist to his stomach, hugging him into my chest. “Morning, Tweek,” I mumbled against his skin.

Tweek hummed and nodded. “Morning.” His voice was groggy, and I was positive he was still partially asleep.

But I ignored his obviously still unconscious-state and kept talking, hoping I’d jar him out of it eventually. “You sleep okay?”

I watched as Tweek’s eyes blinked open slowly. He spent a few lazy seconds staring dazedly in front of him, before a massive yawn consumed his entire body. After it passed, he sat up slightly and, rubbing at his eyes, said, “Yeah, actually, I --”

Whatever he was about to say abruptly died on his lips as his entire body tensed. He gaped a breath in, and then shrieked _way_ too fucking loudly for that time of morning, and, to make matters even more unnerving and terrifying for me, he scrambled away from me, screeching, “GAH! Oh, _Jesus_ , that wasn’t a dream?!”

I watched him, confused. I mean, on the one hand, I was slightly proud that he would dream something as awesome as the events of the night before, (even if he had told me about my own central focus in his dreams already), and be that happy and giggly about it. But on the other hand, I was slightly discomforted by the fact that maybe he didn’t actually _want_ what had happened, and was _hoping_ it was just a dream? But as soon as that line of thought started rolling through my mind, I had to remind myself that he had consented wholeheartedly -- _adamantly_ , actually -- because if I had any inkling that he hadn’t, then I would’ve been worried he regretted it. But he couldn’t have, I _knew_ he couldn’t have; everything was too real to be fake. “No?” I said, shifting over to him and observing him quietly, trying not to get concerned by the expression on his face. “Um. Are you okay?”

He nodded shakily, glancing over at me, despite the fact that his eyes were still a little off in space. “GAH! Yeah, I’m fine . . .”

There was an awkward stretch of silence, which I tried to fill up by reaching over to him and patting him on the shin a few times, before allowing my hand to fall still on his leg. He didn’t react much, but he did lift his eyes up to mine, his cheeks rapidly turning pink and the tenseness around his eyes easing up. I gave him a smile, which he returned -- slowly, at first, but it eventually turned into one of those classic, toothy, Tweek smiles that made my heart flutter and my own smile turn somewhat . . . droopy.

“Oh, thank God,” Tweek said, his words accompanied by a happy sigh. “I thought maybe . . .”

“You thought maybe what?” I asked, when his words trailed to a stop.

“I thought you were a dream,” he said, placing his hand on top of my hand that was resting on his leg.

“Nope,” I said, ignoring and welcoming the heat in my cheeks. “Welcome to reality, Tweek. Did you sleep okay?” I decided to pretend like I hadn’t already asked him that last part, like, not even a minute before.

But Tweek, apparently not fazed by the repetition, giggled and said, “Yeah. You?”

“Wasn’t the worst night of my life.”

Tweek’s smile fell and turned to light irritation. “GAH! _Thanks_ , Craig, glad to know I wasn’t your worst, then --”

I rolled my eyes, but smiled at him. “Not that part,” I said, shifting myself so that I was sitting beside him. “I meant the sleeping part. The part before that was fucking sweet.”

Tweek’s cheeks pinkened, but he was smiling, so I smiled, too. “Yeah, it was.”

I wrapped an arm around him, and, without hesitation, he nestled into my side. I held him into me for a few seconds, enjoying the quiet, content embrace we had found ourselves in.

I broke the silence when I buried my nose in his hair and asked, “What time does your plane leave?” It wasn’t exactly a question I wanted to ask, because it wasn’t a question I wanted an answer to, but I knew that Tweek and I were going to be going separate ways until the second semester started again. As much as I wanted to pretend we could’ve just laid in bed for the rest of the day, I knew that our time that day was limited. Which sounds so fucking ominous, but I wasn’t joking, I was going to miss him so much, even though it was only going to be maybe two and a half weeks? I couldn’t remember when the second semester was supposed to start.

Tweek sighed, and he didn’t seem to happy about it either. “Oh, man, I forgot about that. I don’t want to go.” I felt a lurch of empathy for him, and I kissed him on the top of his head as a way to physically show that him and I were on the exact same page. That I wasn’t ready to be away from him, either. He melted into me, and his soft smile came back quickly enough.

“I don’t want you to go. But I want to make the most of the time I still have with you, before you have to go back to the dicks that you call parents.”

If Tweek disagreed with me on that last part, he didn’t mention it. “My flight doesn’t leave till 5:34,” he announced instead.

“It’s only nine o’clock,” I said, planting a kiss to his temple, and then another to his cheek. “We’ve got hours. Think of all the things we could do until then . . .”

Tweek snorted. “We should probably pack.”

I groaned at his words, resting my forehead against the side of his head. Not only did I totally forgot about that, (not like I was bringing much with me, anyway, I only lived an hour and a half away, and I was only going to be gone for two and a half weeks), but he either missed entirely what I was insinuating, or he was rejecting my offer. What exactly I was offering, I wasn’t entirely sure of myself -- not _sex_ , of course, like . . . _up the butt_ sex, but _something_. Nobody ever told me that once you have your first orgasm with another person it was suddenly something much more desirable than you had originally believed it to be. And the fact that any kisses or touches from him wouldn’t repeat until we both met back up in our dorm room in January.

“Can’t we just lay here? For at least a little bit?” I asked, wrapping both arms around him and trapping him against my chest. “I’m not going to see you for a long time.”

Tweek did his little giggle-laugh and nodded, wrapping his arms around my waist. “Yeah. That would make me sooo happy.”

I inwardly ‘aww’ed at his attempt at copying me. He even tried to do the voice. I was aware that I had a somewhat nasally voice, which was kind of weird because my voice was also fairly deep. Okay, really deep. Tweek’s voice, while clearly belonging to a man, was also higher-pitched than other men our age. And he squeaked a lot. Which was why I chuckled at his purposeful lowering of his tone.

It was like when lion cubs try to roar. Except Tweek was a human and he was just talking.

Tweek and I didn’t move until 11:00, and it was probably one of the longest times I’d ever spent just laying in bed doing, essentially, nothing. We talked. He told me about his exams, I told him about mine, we laughed at the dumb people in our classes, we bickered about the likelihood of an alien invasion in our lifetimes, we discussed what show we should binge watch together next. X-Files was a popular request, but Tweek insisted that, at some point, him and I had to take on the daunting task of watching every Simpsons episode ever, and he seemed really excited about it, so that was probably going to happen at some point, too.

I mean, really, the only difference between that morning, and every other morning before that, was the fact that we were in the same bed, we were both half naked, and we might’ve snuck kisses every once in awhile.

We had gotten pretty good at it.

Even if you expected Craig Tucker to be totally gay, you never would’ve guessed he’d be that sort of boyfriend. Cuddling and kissing and talking and laughing . . . it was nothing like me, was it? But Tweek had changed -- or at the very least, minorly altered -- quite a bit of my personality, whether he meant to or not. Probably not. All he did was exist, and every single bit of me that looked down on humanity for it’s simple existence disintegrated to make way for an appreciation for the finer things, the sweet and nice things, that life had to offer.

And, even though he could make words die on my lips, Tweek also had the uncanny ability to make me talk. Not many people were capable of that. Or, no one, really. But Tweek was in a league all on his own, and I was pretty sure that was very obvious.

Once my phone’s clock displayed 11:00, Tweek and I decided to -- begrudgingly -- get dressed. We had some time before Tweek’s plane left, but we had other things to do first. And, as much as I would’ve liked to stay in bed with Tweek forever, I knew that it wasn’t possible.

“You know, we’re gonna have to go to Kenny’s apartment,” Tweek said, as we both sat up, stretching the sleep out of our bodies. “Most of the stuff that I’m bringing home with me is there.”

I tried not to groan at the thought. Because not only was I going to have to see Kenny again, but I was probably going to have a run-in with all the other guys, too, and I just really wasn’t in the mood for that.

“Okay,” I settled on, standing up, and holding a hand out to help him to his feet. “You want to get it over with now? Because you know Kenny’s going to ask questions, and I’d rather get it out of the way sooner than later.”

Tweek rolled his eyes. “You know, we don’t actually have to tell Kenny anything. Just because he’s our friend doesn’t mean he has to know.”

I tilted my lips downwards, impressed by Tweek’s initiative and desire to be as emotionally secluded -- in that respect -- as I was. “Sweet. I like it. The less they know the better.”

“But . . . we can tell them that we’re dating, right?” Tweek asked sheepishly, looking at me from under his eyelashes. “You’re not . . . _out_ yet, are you? We can . . . GAH! I mean, we can . . . _hide_ it . . . if you want . . .” He looked like he thought I was going to force him to keep it -- to keep _us_ \-- a secret. Like him being my boyfriend was too _shameful_ to share with anybody. And sure, it’d probably be a while before it made it back to my parents, but not the other guys. I didn’t care if _they_ knew. If they said anything I’d just kick their asses, and then they’d probably never do it again. And like half of them were gay, anyway.

I shook my head. “Of course I don’t want to hide it. I have no problem telling them about us. Just . . . no details, okay? They don’t need details.”

Tweek sighed, relieved. “No details.”

“Good,” I said, with a satisfied nod. “Now, I don’t know about you, but I desperately need a shower.”

Tweek looked down at his body, scrunched his nose up, and nodded. “Ugh, me, too.”

* * *

I showered fairly quickly, and was the first of the two of us to exit my shower stall, a towel wrapped around my waist, and water dripping from my hair and eroding wet paths down my neck and shoulders. I was thankful that the shower room was empty, which was probably because it was the day everybody was leaving, and most people would prefer to shower in the comfort of their own homes. Not in a _mostly_ -clean shower room at an all-guys dorm building.

I dressed quickly, running my towel through my hair quickly, making a mental note to not forget my hat when we made it back to our dorm room. I actually couldn’t believe I’d gone that long without it. The last time I had spent so much time hatless, I was at Nikiel’s apartment, and the only reason for that was because, to use Nikiel’s words, I was about to die from “heat stroke”. I made a silent oath to myself not to abandon that hat every again. I loved that hat. I was pretty sure that, when I died, my soul would be wearing it.

I leaned against the wall by the last stall after I finished dressing, waiting for Tweek to come out.

It only took Tweek another, maybe minute or two, before I heard his tap turn off. I guess he turned around, because I heard a banging noise and an irritated voice hiss, “GAH! _Fuck_ , man . . .”

I smirked, rolling my eyes and folding my arms over my chest. Even though I was very strict with myself not to find Tweek absolutely adorable, (before I realized I was totally gay for him), I remember reluctantly admitting to myself that Tweek’s behavior in the shower was cute. Because it was. The straightest man in existence wouldn’t have the strength to deny it. I considered that straightest man to be Stan. He was almost toxically straight, to the point that maybe he was a little gayer than he thought. Not _totally_ gay, but just gay enough to acknowledge. If that makes any fucking sense. And I knew that, if he’d been in the shower room with Tweek, he wouldn’t have been able to keep the smile from his face.

“NGH! Okay, I’m coming out now,” Tweek’s voice warned, and my eyes drifted down to the exposed bit at the bottom of the stall, to where his feet were anxiously shifting his weight. I kind of wanted him to not do that, because Tweek was clumsier in the shower than he was normally, and there was a good chance he’d slip on the floor and crack his head open.

But I pushed that thought aside when his feet stilled. I opened my mouth, planning on responding to his warning with a teasing, “You’ve been out for awhile now, Tweek,” but he beat me to it, sighing roughly and saying,

“And if you make a joke about me being gay, I won’t let you touch me for the rest of the day.”

I tilted my lips downwards, impressed by his intuitive threat. It was totally empty, but I was impressed anyway.

It took Tweek all of five minutes to dry off and get dressed, and, when he said I could turn around, he was bent at the waist, hands rapidly scratching a towel through his hair. I observed him thoughtfully, and, when he straightened again, my eyes immediately caught onto the fact that his shirt wasn’t buttoned correctly. In the months I’d known him, I’d never seen him button his shirt the right way.

But I didn’t mind the view, so I kept my mouth shut.

Tweek and I walked back up the three flights of stairs to our dorm room, our hands clasped together as we relaxed into an easy silence. Fuck, I was really going to miss that when he left.

After I unlocked our door and guided him inside, I tried to remember what I was going to bring with me back home. Probably just underwear, deodorant, my laptop. Shit like that. Everything else could’ve stayed, because it wasn’t like I was going to be gone for months.

Tweek sat on his bed folding his legs in the style that Buddhists, or Hindus or whatever use when they meditate. He rested his elbows on his knees, and balanced his chin in his palms as he watched me stuff whatever I needed into my backpack. It only took a couple minutes, and, when my backpack was at max capacity, I stood back and went over the list in my head.

Before I could do anything else, my phone on my bedside table pinged. I absently grabbed for it, let the phone sense my fingerprint, and tapped to my messages.

It was from my mom.

 _We’ll be there at four, after your father gets out of work_.

Short and to the point, like a true Tucker. But I was happy she’d texted me, because I completely forgot to tell her that I was going to bring Tweek to the airport. Not that she knew -- or probably remembered -- who Tweek was, nor did I think she’d care either way, but still, proper etiquette to inform her. And I knew that they hadn’t left yet, because my entire family was _very_ predictable, and I had been around them long enough to be able to anticipate that kind of thing. So, before we left, I sent my mom a text that said,

 _Can you pick me up at the airport instead? Dropping a friend off_.

I hesitated for only a second at the word friend, but I ultimately decided to keep it vague as possible, not like Mom would pry. She wasn’t one for that, and I’d deduced that it was because she didn’t care. And I didn’t get a response either way, but, unless they had something planned that I didn’t know about, it shouldn’t have been a problem.

I swept the room again just to make sure I wasn’t forgetting anything, and I nodded in satisfaction when my brain came up empty. “Okay. Done,” I said, turning around to Tweek, who was swiping through his phone at something. He looked up, and nodded, darkening his phone and hopping to his feet clumsily.

“Don’t forget your coat,” I said to him, nodding at the jacket that was balancing precariously off the edge of Tweek’s bed. As soon as the words left my mouth, I remembered something. Something that I actually couldn’t believe I’d forgotten, because it was a pivotal moment in our friendship. That green sweatshirt, the unintentional side gift that went along with Tweek’s coat. I hadn’t seen it in awhile. I mean, it wasn’t like I’d gone _looking_ for it; I avoided Tweek’s side of the room like the plague in that two week stint he was gone. I just couldn’t remember even catching a glimpse of it at all, even accidentally.

After a few seconds of silence that consisted mostly of us pulling our coats on and zipping them up, I leveled a look at him and asked, “Where’s your green sweatshirt?” I tried to keep the hope out of my voice that he still had it. I didn’t think I would’ve been _mad_ if he had gotten rid of it. I had learned first-hand that Tweek was slightly irrational when he was angry, and did things on impulse. So the likelihood of him destroying, or burning, or throwing it into a dumpster was high enough for me to be concerned about.

Tweek’s hands had just pulled his zipper up, but he paused in that position, and averted his eyes. “It, um . . . it’s at Kenny’s. I brought it with me. To Kenny’s. After. You know.”

I raised an eyebrow at that, pleasantly surprised. “You did? Why?”

He shrugged, clutching at the front of his coat and staring at the floor. He said, his voice defensive, “I don’t know, man, I just packed it with me when I went to stay with him, it’s no big deal."

Even though he looked really anxious and nervous, I couldn’t help that a part of me melted at his words. Because he brought the sweatshirt I gave him with him when he left? He was under the impression that he hated me, and he _still_ brought it with him?

Fuck, it was enough to make me blush.

I cleared my throat, “Oh,” I said blankly, my voice not even close to expressing how flattered I was. “Okay.”

“Yeah.”

“That was . . . nice of you, I guess.”

Tweek was quiet for a second -- well, in midst of his normal noises -- his eyes still fixed somewhere other than my face. “I really like that sweatshirt. And my coat. And you.”

I smiled, holding out a hand for him to take. He didn’t notice, so I took his hand for him, and smiled even wider when he looked up sheepishly and intertwined our fingers. “We can get it when we head over to Kenny’s.”

He nodded, squeezing my hand. “Okay.”

“So you ready to go?”

“Yeah, man.”

* * *

I raised a fist to knock at the Kenny’s apartment door, but Tweek grabbed hold of my hand and lowered it. I raised an eyebrow, giving him a questioning look.

“I have a spare key,” he said as an explanation, showing me a silver key that he had taken from his jean pocket. I didn’t know how to respond to that, so I just nodded.

After he unlocked the door, we made our way inside, letting go of each other’s hands so that we could take off our coats. Tweek told me to just hang them up on the three hooks by the door, so I did, and then held a hand out for him to grab.

We heard the tv on in the living room, so Tweek and I followed the noise and there, sitting together on the couch, were Kenny and Butters. They were watching some reality tv show, but I didn’t know the name of it. They looked up when they heard us walk in, and, when they saw our clasped hands, they both smiled.

“Seems like you two had a good night?” Kenny asked as a way of a greeting.

“Yep,” I said blankly.

“The best,” Tweek agreed.

“You guys are boyfriends?” Butters asked excitedly. But almost immediately his smile fell and he gave me a stern glare. “Did ol’ Craig apologize?”

I felt very uncomfortable under his stare, squeezing Tweek’s hand and averting my eyes. Fuck, I wished people would stop bringing it up. I was ashamed enough as it was, and I was sure Tweek was pretty ashamed, too, if his incessant apologies from the night before said anything.

And I guess Tweek noticed how uncomfortable I was, because he drew the attention onto himself -- an action that I appreciated -- and said, “GAH! He did, and I apologized, too, so now we --”

“Wait, _you_ apologized?” Kenny asked, furrowing his eyebrows. “For what?”

I exchanged a look with Tweek, and I think we both mutually agreed that that was one of the things we were keeping to ourselves.

“Things,” he said, shrugging.

“It doesn’t matter anymore,” I agreed.

“I came here to get my stuff,” Tweek continued, turning the subject drastically away from where our conversation was headed. The more he spoke, the faster his voice got. “I haven’t packed, ngh -- _anything_ yet, and my plane leaves at 5:34.” He sucked in a breath. “Oh, _Jesus_ , what if I don’t make it in time, and I have no way of making it back home, and my parents think I’m _dead_ \--”

“We’re going to make it in time,” I said flatly, unwilling to make my voice anything else in the presence of Kenny and Butters. “I’m taking you to the airport, remember? I won’t let you miss your flight.”

Tweek let out a breath, and squeezed my hand, but didn’t say anything other than a nod.

Kenny chuckled, and, when I looked at him, he had a smirk on his face. Harmless, but annoying: those three words I think summed up Kenny’s personality perfectly. “I put all your stuff back in your duffle bag and put it in my bedroom. Stan invited everyone over last night for an end-of-the-semester party, so I hid your stuff so they wouldn’t go through it.”

“GAH! They’d do that?” Tweek asked, looking up at me, surprised.

I smiled on the inside. What I wouldn’t give to be that naive again. I mean, probably not a lot, because being that naive can be really fucking dangerous, and Tweek was lucky he had people watching out for him, but still, it was endearing. “Yeah,” I said. “They’re assholes. I really can’t say it enough.”

“It’s already packed,” Kenny said, dismissing what I’d said. “You can double check if you want, but everything’s in there.”

Tweek smiled at Kenny, and -- instead of feeling that jealousy that I was used to feeling whenever something like that happened -- I found myself smiling at the fact that Tweek was smiling. Didn’t matter who he was smiling at, as long as he was happy.

What a mood shift.

“NGH! Thanks, Kenny,” Tweek said gratefully. “I didn’t even think of it until this morning.”

“Well, good, you can grab it on your way out. Did you guys wanna hang out for awhile?” Kenny asked, gesturing to the TV. “We’re watching Desperate Housewives.”

I rolled my eyes. Of course they were watching Desperate Housewives. Somehow that made total sense. Before I could say anything, a woman from the show screamed, “ _You can fucking choke on a dick, you weak bitch!_ ” and, when I looked over, there were these two women fighting, one with wine in her hair and dribbling onto her white shirt.

God, they were so annoying. I glowered at the screen. “I can see that.”

“Oh, Jesus! You actually _like_ this show?!” Tweek exclaimed, staring with wide eyes as two women screamed and pulled each other’s hair. “What are they even fighting about?”

Kenny chuckled. “The one with brown hair said the blonde one’s hair was fake.”

“So she’s trying to beat her up? Oh, man! _Why_?”

I stroked Tweek’s hand with my thumb, kind of amused by how worked up he was getting over a stupid, hyped-up, faked reality tv show. “It’s all fake, Tweek. Cheap entertainment. None of it’s real.”

Tweek looked at me incredulously. “Why would someone fake this?”

“Because people are stupid,” I said, shrugging. “You know that. I wouldn’t worry about it.”

He let out a breath, nestling casually into my side, like it was no big deal. I mean, in reality, it wasn’t, but we’d never acted like that in front of anybody before. The closest we ever got to that was at the party in the frat house’ basement, when Tweek practically fell into my lap because he couldn’t stand up on his own. Or that time he got so excited about his coat that he hugged me in the middle of a sidewalk.

“People _are_ stupid, aren’t they?”

I let go of his hand so I could wrap my arm around his shoulders. I kept my eyes on him so as to avoid the expressions on Kenny and Butters’ faces. As much as I wanted to hide the affectionate side away from everybody except for Tweek, I only had like five hours left with him, and I wasn’t going to crack under their dumbass teasing. “Yeah. Most people.”

Tweek looked up at me with a smile. “Pretty much everybody.”

“That _I’ve_ ever met.”

Tweek did his little giggle-laugh. “Does that include me?”

I didn’t smile at him -- because I wasn’t sure I was ready to go more than just simple physical gestures in front of other people -- but I gave him as warm a blank expression as I could. “Of course not.”

“Jesus, you guys, get a room,” Kenny said with a laugh. “Or at least tone down your mating dance a little --”

I tore my gaze away from Tweek to frown at Kenny, ignoring the flash of heat in my cheeks. There was nothing in that brief interaction with Tweek that suggested that there was any . . . _mating dance_ going on. We didn’t have a _mating dance_ , we weren’t like Kyle and Cartman, that apparently had a chaotic ritual that had to be performed before they did anything . . . _like that_ together. Tweek and I were just talking, like we always did.

“What are you talking about?” I asked flatly.

Kenny smirked at me. “Your flirting is cute and all, but Butters and I are trying to watch Desperate Housewives. Tiffany just called Regina fat, sooo --”

Before he could continue -- or before one of us could shut him up -- my phone pinged from my pocket. I figured it was probably Clyde, (or maybe my mom, but probably Clyde), because I’d ghosted him enough over that couple of weeks, and he and Token were probably still worried about me. And I had also completely forgotten to tell them about the events from the night before.

I pulled my phone out of my pocket and saw that the message was actually from Nikiel. And it was a long one, too, so I let the censor screen my fingerprint, and I went to my messages, clicking on the one that said “Nikiel”.

_Hey, Craig. I haven’t heard from you in a few days and I’m starting to really worry. I know that you leave today, but can you manage to swing by my apartment before you go? I need to make sure you’re okay. Or at least just text me or call me or something so I know you’re still alive. Maybe if you have time, we can watch a movie or something. I just got a new brand of coffee, and I think you’ll like this one more. Even with milk and sugar, it still smells like the beans. Well, anyway, call me, okay?_

I read through the whole thing twice. He was treating me like a child -- did he always talk to me like that? I couldn’t remember acting like I needed to be babied, but it kind of felt like he’d just always talked to me like that.

I clicked on the text box and said typed, _Thanks. I’m fine, though_ , and hit send.

There was probably a five second pause before my phone started ringing. It was Nikiel.

Tweek looked over at me curiously. I didn’t normally get phone calls. I didn’t think I had a single actual phone call that entire semester, that I could remember -- besides when Clyde called me that one time, but Tweek didn’t know about that. “Is it Clyde?” he asked. Because, of all the people I hung out with, Clyde was definitely the most likely to call me.

I hesitated in telling him the truth, because I almost didn’t want Tweek to worry about me, that Nikiel was trying to solicit more vodka. But that hesitation only lasted half a second, because there was no way I was keeping anything from him. Especially not something that sensitive. That’d be a real dick move.

“It’s Nikiel.”

Tweek’s face hardened and he frowned at me. “Your vodka guy?”

I nodded.

Tweek worried his bottom lip, watching me cautiously, before saying, “Well? Aren’t you going to answer it?”

I raised an eyebrow. I hadn’t expected that. Most of me was expecting Tweek to panic and ask me to delete his phone number. I didn’t know for sure what Tweek’s thoughts about Nikiel were, I just knew that it wasn’t exactly friendly. He probably thought Nikiel was some horny guy that wanted to use me for sex, but that really couldn’t have been further from the truth. And that wasn’t fair to Nikiel, who was actually a really, really good person. A little overbearing, and made questionable decisions in the name of helping his friends, but a good guy anyway.

And I was definitely not expecting Tweek to suggest I actually _answer_ Nikiel’s call.

“I’ll put it on speaker phone,” I offered, and he nodded at me.

I figured that was fair. I wouldn’t ask, but I would hope Tweek would do the same thing, if his vodka guy just called randomly on a Saturday morning. And besides, I wanted Tweek to see that Nikiel wasn’t a terrible person. I wanted him and Tweek to get along. Not that Nikiel would have a problem with Tweek, but Tweek was a hothead, easily irritated, and I was sure that someone like Nikiel -- who had been, not the _cause_ , but the _source_ of my vodka inclination -- would be too much for Tweek to handle.

But, anyway, I answered the call and immediately put it on speaker phone, holding it up so that Kenny and Butters -- who had muted the tv and were watching us from across the room -- could hear it, too. “Hello?”

“ _Jesus, Craig, has anyone told you that you are an_ extremely _frustrating human being?_ ” Nikiel exclaimed over the phone.

I glanced over at Tweek, who looked up at me with wide eyes. He probably didn’t expect Nikiel to talk to me like that. I mean, _I_ didn’t expect Nikiel to talk to me like that, but I figured I’d been kind of treating him like shit for a while, so I knew I deserved it. “I’ve been told that by several people. What do you want?”

“ _What, my text didn’t tell you?_ ” Nikiel spat. He sounded really, really angry. “ _You ignored me for three days! The last time I saw you, you were carrying two full bottles of vodka to your dorm room, and the last time I_ heard _from you, you sent me a text message that said, and I’m looking at it right now: ‘Craig. Fine.’_ ” Nikiel huffed. _“What the_ fuck _am I supposed to do with that --_ ”

I winced, staring at the stained carpet of Kenny and Stan’s apartment, and chewing on my bottom lip. Anger didn’t sound right on Nikiel. And it just made the guilt that I’d tried to dull in regards to specifically Nikiel flare up again. “I’m . . . ugh, sorry, Nikiel. I didn’t mean to ignore you --”

“ _But you still did!_ ” Nikiel exclaimed, and I could just picture him pacing around in his perfectly-neat apartment, an angry scowl on his face and his unnaturally white teeth bared.

I got the sense that he wasn’t finished talking, so I waited a few seconds, before Nikiel let out a harsh breath. “ _Fuck, Craig, I’m going out of my mind here . . ._ ”

“Well. Stop.”

“ _I can’t just_ stop _, Craig, it doesn’t work like that_ \--”

I shook my head, even though he couldn’t see me. “Nikiel, I’m fine --”

“ _No, you lying asshole, you’re_ not _fine_ \--”

“Thanks for that,” I said blankly. Like I hadn’t been called a ‘lying asshole’ enough already. “But seriously, this time I’m really fine.”

Nikiel was silent for a few seconds, before he said quietly, “ _You should stop by._ ”

I raised an eyebrow at the weird tone of his voice. “I can’t, I’m --”

“ _Fuck whatever else you have to do,”_ Nikiel said, his voice strangled slightly, as if he were holding something back. _“I don’t know if you know this, but whenever someone as fucked up as you are suddenly gets_ fine _, just . . . fuck, Craig, that’s not a good thing! You can’t spend the day by yourself, I will hunt you down and lock you in my apartment until your parents come to get you. You are_ not _hurting yourself, Craig_ \--”

I sighed, and pinched the bridge of my nose. I mean, from his end it sounded like he was really worried, but from my end, it sounded kind of dramatic. But that was only because I knew what actually happened. Nikiel was still under the impression that I was a drunk who could hardly function. “Nikiel, relax, it isn’t anything like that.”

“ _Then what is it?_ ” Nikiel’s voice had an edge that was definitely not normal for him.

“I have a boyfriend now,” I said, glancing at Tweek, who gave me an uncertain smile. “I’m happy. I should’ve told you sooner, but it’s a new development. Like, last night new.”

There was more silence on Nikiel’s end of the phone. “ _If you’re lying to me, I want you to tell me now before it gets out of hand._ ”

“I’m not lying to you.”

“ _Swear on your life._ ”

“I swear on my life.”

Another, albeit smaller, beat of silence, before Nikiel said, his voice slightly high-pitched, like he was trying to hide the fact that he was excited, “ _A boyfriend?_ _You really, actually have a boyfriend? Who is it? Is it Tweek?_ ”

I smiled to myself. “Yeah. It’s Tweek.”

It was weird, but the worry and desperation in Nikiel’s voice suddenly disappeared. “ _You got your Saturn! Baby boy, I’m so happy for you!_ ”

“Don’t call me that,” I said halfheartedly, but the whole situation was too good to really be mad at.

“ _No way, the concrete giraffe that once told me that feelings were the work of Satan, is happy and has a boyfriend, that’s amazing, and I don’t even care what you say, I’m going to call you baby, because that’s what you are --_ ”

I decided to ignore that last part. Because I didn’t remember ever saying that feelings were the work of Satan. I mean, yeah, that was my main philosophy for the better part of two weeks, but I usually just summed that up by saying ‘fuck emotions’, not ‘feelings are the work of Satan.’ That’s way too fucking wordy for me.

“When did I say feelings were the work of Satan?” I asked, staring at some random place on the wall. “I don’t remember that.”

“ _You wouldn’t,_ ” Nikiel said. " _You were blackout drunk. It was that first night, remember? Well, you_ wouldn’t _remember, but I know you remember the next morning_.”

I let out a breath. Because, yeah, that morning was probably one of the most awkward wake-ups that I’d ever experienced. And a little jarring, too, to find myself in some other guys bed. Because I knew that _conscious_ me would never do anything. . . ugh, _sexual_ with Nikiel, but to not remember your actions for a night, and then ending up in such a compromising position was the most panicked I’d felt in the shortest amount of time.

But I would have to remember to word it differently whenever I did end up telling Tweek the details of that first night with Nikiel. Just telling him that I’d slept with Nikiel probably -- _definitely_ wouldn’t go over well. Even saying we were sleeping in the same bed would make him flip his shit. Fuck, I’d flip my shit if Tweek were to tell me he’d slept in a bed with Kenny.

Because Tweek was jealous of Nikiel, and I was jealous of Kenny, and the whole thing fucking sucked. But at least we were over it; Tweek now knew he had nothing to worry about with Nikiel, and I knew that I had nothing to worry about with Kenny.

I just shrugged, though, and said, “Yeah, well. That night after midnight is a blur.”

“ _Tell me about it,_ ” Nikiel said with a short laugh, before exhaling and continuing, his voice more somber, “ _I don’t think you get it, baby, for the_ life _of me, I couldn’t get you to stop crying --_ ”

“Okay, enough,” I said loudly, avoiding eye contact with everyone in the room. That was not something they needed to know about. Couldn’t fucking believe I let Nikiel see me like that, it pisses me off to this day.

“ _Yeah, I know, I know, Tucker’s don’t cry, except for that one time_ ,” Nikiel said, a very obvious eye roll in his voice. “ _You need to learn to be more in touch with your emotions_ \--”

“You need to learn to fuck off --”

“ _But at least you have Tweek to help you now, because there’s no way you’d ever listen to me._ ” Nikiel sighed. “ _I really am happy for you, Craig. You deserve happiness. And, hey, maybe, at some point, Tweek’ll stop hating me -_ -”

“I . . . don’t think Tweek hates you?” I said, raising an eyebrow at Tweek. He had a contemplative expression on his face, but it wasn’t angry, or hateful, so I knew that, at the very least, he’d be able to tolerate Nikiel’s existence if they had to be in a room together. And Nikiel was the kind of guy that grew on you like fungi, so it was only a matter of time before they’d be able to hang out together.

But Nikiel just chuckled and said, “ _No, I’m pretty sure he hates me. He’d have every reason to; if he’s dating you, it means he likes you, and there’s no way he’d ever like the guy who gave his guy vodka to cope -_ -”

“It’s okay, I kind of understand,” Tweek blurted out shakily, before he could help himself. He slapped his hands to his mouth and glanced up at me, as if searching for confirmation that it was okay to talk under those circumstances. I shrugged and nodded.

“ _Uh, Craig?_ ” Nikiel asked, suspiciously after a beat of silence. “ _That didn’t sound like you._ ”

“That’s because it wasn’t me.”

“. . . _Am I on speakerphone?_ ”

“Kind of.”

“ _Great. Kind of. So who was that just talking?_ ”

“That was Tweek.”

“ _Your_ boyfriend _, Tweek?_ ”

“Yep.”

“ _The one that hates me?_ ”

Tweek let out an irritated huff. “I don’t hate you! Craig doesn’t hate you, and Craig hates everyone, so there’s gotta be _something_ good in you.” As soon as those words left this mouth, he cringed, and I cringed, and I think everybody who heard Tweek’s words cringed, because, even though I knew Tweek didn’t mean for it to come out that way, it most definitely sounded like the dickiest comment in the world.

“I didn’t mean that,” Tweek said sheepishly, tugging at the front of my sweatshirt. “I just -- I like you, is what I mean. I don’t have a reason not to.” He cringed again, worrying his bottom lip. “I’m making this sound worse, aren’t I?” he asked, trying to laugh his way through the awkward conversation.

“ _It’s cool, I get it,_ ” Nikiel said, even though he sounded kind of sad.

“No, you _don’t_ get it,” Tweek said harshly. “I hated you for a really long time. But I don’t anymore.”

“ _Why not?_ ”

“Because now I know that you aren’t a leech trying to steal Craig away from me,” Tweek explained. “I mean, I heard you call him ‘baby’, and you gave him your number and asked him out, I just . . .” he sighed roughly. “I was jealous, but I’m not anymore. I’m sorry for hating you for no reason.”

Nikiel laughed. “ _You had a reason. It may have been irrational, but it was a reason, and, under the circumstances, I’d say your reason was valid_.”

Tweek smiled. It was small, and if you weren’t trained in the art of reading Tweek, you wouldn’t have noticed it. It was mostly a quirk of the eyes, but it was there. I figured if Tweek calmed down a little bit, he’d realize that Nikiel was actually not a terrible guy, and would make a great friend for him. “I guess.”

“ _Well, if you two are together, I bet you don’t want to be talking to me,_ ” Nikiel said with an awkward chuckle. “ _I guess I’ll let you guys go._ ”

“I’ll text you later,” I said, squeezing Tweek’s hand to reassure him that it wasn’t going to be anything alcohol-related.

“You’re _offering to text_ me _?_ ” Nikiel said, the good humor returning to his voice. “ _Baby boy, I’m surprised at you_ \--”

“Shut up, Nikiel.”

He just laughed. “ _Okay, okay. I’ll talk to you later, Craig. And it was nice talking to you, Tweek._ ”

“You, too,” Tweek replied casually.

“‘Bye,” I said, and then, without waiting for a response, I hung up.

There was a beat of silence, in which I refused to talk to anybody, and I guess nobody had anything to say.

But, surprise surprise, _Kenny_ broke that silence when he quirked his eyebrows and said, “ _That_ was Nikiel?”

I nodded. “Yeah.”

“He’s . . . not what I was expecting --”

“Oh, hamburgers!” Butters exclaimed, thankfully interrupting the very awkward conversation that was about to happen. “It’s 12:00!”

“What’s at 12:00?” Tweek asked.

“Everybody’s meeting for lunch,” Kenny explained, switching the tv off and helping Butters to his feet. “You two are coming, right?”

If you know anything about me at all, you should know that I had no particular desire to go. And I was pretty sure Tweek didn’t either, but, despite the fact that I _knew_ Tweek didn’t want to go, I also knew that he was going to say yes, anyway. He had a habit of doing that.

“GAH! Okay,” Tweek said, glancing up at me. He was asking if I was coming, too, I could tell.

I sighed. Like I was going to let Tweek face Cartman by himself. “Yeah, okay.”

I was going to regret saying yes, but if I’d said no, I probably would’ve regretted that, too. But I just resigned myself to the fact that I probably wasn’t going to get much more alone time with Tweek.

* * *

We were meeting everybody at the diner that the Bitch worked at. I guess it was the only restaurant around that could hold large parties like ours and not have us all split into different tables. The Bitch wasn’t in sight, so I figured the experience was starting out okay already.

Our waitress -- a busty woman with bright red lipstick and black hair that was very obviously dyed -- lead the four of us to a table towards the back. Bebe and Wendy were already there, both sitting side by side and giggling about something.

The expected happened: “Buttercup!” Bebe exclaimed, waving him over to her. Butters called her name back, with an equal amount of unnecessary enthusiasm, and they both excitedly chattered away as Tweek and I found seats beside Kenny.

Tweek was jittering. He was nervous. I wasn’t entirely sure why, but Tweek never really needed a reason to be nervous, he just pretty much always was, so I grabbed his hand under the table and held it gently but firmly in mine. His attention jerked over to me, and he gave me a weak smile, which I returned with a smaller, more difficult to decipher smile, but Tweek seemed to get the message.

“What’s going on?” Wendy asked, almost suspiciously. “You seem . . . happy.”

It took me a second to realize that she was talking to me, and I looked over at her narrowed eyes and quirked lips. I ignored my heated cheeks and raised an eyebrow at her. “What do you mean?”

“You’re smiling,” she observed diplomatically.

You know how I said before that I hate it when people point out my emotions? Well, any happiness I felt being around Tweek was smothered by Wendy drawing attention to it. “Yeah, I _was_.”

“Craig Tucker? _Smiling_?” Bebe said with a laugh. I turned my attention to her, and she had a wide amused smile on her face. “Is that even possible?”

“Sure it is!” Butters exclaimed happily. “He’s been smiling a whole lot since he met Tweek! It’s awful sweet!”

“Guys just . . . okay?” I said irritably, dropping my chin into the palm of my free hand, elbow propped up on the table beside my menu.

“You think _this_ is bad?” Kenny said with a laugh. “Wait till Cartman gets here.”

Kenny’s words hung out in the open for a second, tops, when speak of the fucking devil, Cartman’s voice -- loud, boisterous, obnoxious -- could be heard from the waiting area: “--just saying, Kahl, maybe if you ate more you wouldn’t be so pissy all the time --”

“I’m not pissy all the time because I’m _hungry_ , I’m -- wait . . . I am _not_ pissy all the time --”

“Will you two shut up?” Clyde asked, his voice tired and irritated. “You’ve been going at it all morning, you’re giving me a headache.”

“You’re just depressed because Craig went AWOL,” Stan said, an eye roll in his voice. “He’s an adult, get over it --”

And then the group entered the eating area like a pack of retarded wolves. Clyde had a sad, worried expression on his face, and Token kind of did, too, although it was masked better. I had completely forgotten that I was supposed to tell both of them what happened with Tweek. And I guess when they went over to my dorm room, I wasn’t there. And I knew that they had grown accustomed to me not being there, but the reason as to why I wasn’t there wasn’t what I’m sure they were expecting.

Token looked up, surveying the room for a sign of the girls and Kenny and Butters, when his eyes found their way to me. He looked surprised, and immediately smacked Clyde on the shoulder, and said across the empty restaurant, “Craig? What are you doing here?”

Clyde had jolted at Token’s punch, but, after hearing Token’s words, snapped to attention too. He looked around the room, found me, and exclaimed, “ _Craig_? What are you doing here?”

I shrugged, trying to ignore the weird frowns on both of their faces. “Tweek had to get his duffle bag. It has all his stuff in it. We got to Kenny’s apartment. We were invited to lunch. I’m starting to regret it now.”

Clyde’s surprise only got more obvious. His eyes flicked over to the five-and-a-half foot manchild who’s shoulder was pressed against mine. “ _Tweek_?”

Tweek and I looked at each other. I could tell he was confused as to why Clyde felt the need for me to repeat one of his friend’s name. But I understood a little better; probably a lot of Clyde’s confusion came from disbelief. I’m not so sure he was actually expecting the outcome of Tweek and my get-together the night before.   

“Yeah. Tweek,” I said. The looks I was getting from all the guys made me a little self-conscious, but, as nervous as I was for all the guys to see me doing boyfriend-y things with Tweek, I wasn’t willing to push Tweek away.

A slow, but excited, smile spread across Clyde’s face, and he glanced between Tweek and I, before settling a look at me, as if trying to confirm his suspicion. I nodded to him, and probably the biggest smile I’d ever seen latched itself onto Clyde’s chubby face. I knew he knew better than to say it out loud, because he changed his toothy smile into a close-mouthed smile in the attempt to keep himself quiet. Verbally, at least, I heard him squeak at least five times in the span of ten seconds, but I let it pass. I considered that morning to be a special occasion, and was willing to put up with more bullshit than normal.

The guys found seats around the table. It was a little cramped, but it didn’t seem like anybody cared. It seemed like the majority of the guys realized what was going on. I was expecting them to laugh or make fun of us, but there really wasn’t any of that happening. Clyde was silently swooning. Token was smiling. Kyle and Cartman were the two I was most worried about. Well, just Cartman, actually. But, surprisingly, he didn’t say anything at first.

Probably the most predictable response out of all the guys was Stan, who looked pathetically confused. The poor, dense asshole. “Uh . . . what’s going on?”

“What’s it look like?” Cartman said distractedly, intensely scanning through the menu in front of him. “Tweek and Craig finally grew some balls and fucked out the sexual tension.”

Tweek sucked in a breath, and, when I looked at him, his cheeks were red. “GAH! No, we didn’t!” Tweek exclaimed, staring at Cartman with wide eyes.

“Sure looks like you did,” Cartman said carelessly.

“Well we _didn’t_ ,” Tweek repeated, his voice harsher.

“What happened, then?” Token asked. He was a couple seats down from me, in between Stan and Clyde.

I frowned, ignoring the heat in my cheeks from Cartman’s previous comment. _No details_ , I remember telling Tweek, so I gave the most condensed version that I possibly could in the blankest voice I could manage: “Shit went down. Now we’re dating.”

Everybody was staring at me, and that just made me more irritated than I’d been before. I hated being the center of attention more than almost anything else, and I could see the questions in everybody’s faces. I was preparing myself to say no to everything they asked me. Even Tweek was looking at me, unblinkingly, although I was pretty sure he was staring at me out of a need for reassurance, because he was kind of shaking a fuck ton next to me.

And that reminded me. Tweek was only out to Kenny and Butters. He had never come out to everybody else, and that wasn’t something I’d even considered before blurting that out. I mean, everybody kind of knew anyway, but it was the principle, you know?

But Tweek didn’t seem to concerned with the _coming out_ part. It was more the _coming out as my boyfriend_ part. He was like me like that. Didn’t like it when people knew too much about him. Especially people that were guaranteed to make fun of him.

“How come Clyde and I are _just_ finding out about this now?” Token asked, folding his arms over his chest and watching me intently. He actually looked a little irritated, but I only noticed it because I’d seen him irritated before. He was a calm irritated, kept his voice pretty blank and low.

“Yeah, dude, you should’ve texted us!” Clyde said. He had sat next to me immediately and kept glancing at me excitedly. “We just went to your dorm room to check on you, but you weren’t there!”

“Okay, so why didn’t _you_ text _me_?” I asked, raising an eyebrow at him.

“Because, asshole, you haven’t been texting me back, like, at all lately,” Clyde said with a frown. “I figured it’d be a waste of time, and that asking everybody at lunch would be better.”

“NGH! Craig and I were busy last night!” Tweek exclaimed, tearing his eyes away from me to stare at Clyde. “We didn’t have time for that!”

“Oh-ho-ho, so the truth is out!” Cartman exclaimed, laughing annoyingly. “Craig and Tweek were _busy_ \--”

“GAH! I didn’t mean it like _that_ \--” Tweek pretty much shouted, his eyes narrowed at Cartman.

“Judging by the massive bruise on your neck, I’m pretty sure you _did_ mean it like that,” Kyle said nonchalantly, his eyes drifting to the hickey on the side of Tweek’s neck.

Tweek blushed, and I blushed, and then Tweek pulled away from me, just so I could fully see the scowl on his face. “GAH! God _dammit_ , Craig --”

“ _I’m_ sorry, it’s not like I did it on _purpose_ ,” I said defensively, frowning at him. He quirked his lips off to the side, as if he were trying to think of ways to argue with me, but was ultimately coming up empty. Which made sense, because I hadn’t done anything wrong. So, he narrowed his eyes instead, and said,

“Just -- GAH! -- Don’t do it again!”

My eyes grew a little half-lidded and, dropping my chin into my palm again, I observed him out of the corner of my eye. “You don’t want me to do it again? Are you sure?”

“NGH! _Yes_!”

I cracked a smile at how emphatically he was speaking. “Are you really sure?”

Tweek seemed more hesitant. “Uh . . . yeah . . .”

“. . .  _Really_ sure?”

Tweek was quiet for a few seconds, before he squeezed my hand under the table and mumbled, “Shut up.”

I grinned. Because I had the tendency to get a little lost in Tweek whenever he did anything cute at all, I had completely forgotten that the Asshole Quartet -- and Clyde, Token and Butters -- were sitting at the same table. I only realized that when I heard the annoying snickers coming from all around me, and I tore my eyes from Tweek’s face and immediately stared at my menu, frowning through the blush on my face.

Before anybody could actually start making fun of Tweek and I, the busty waitress from before came waltzing over, a sweet grandmotherly smile on her face. “Hello, dears, my name’s Agatha, I’ll be your server today. Just call me Aggie, though; dear Lord, if I hear someone call me Agatha one more time today I’m going to sneak arsenic in the tap water.” She let out a chuckle that was not echoed by anybody else. “Can I start you all off with some drinks?”

There were quick responses from everybody around the table -- with Tweek exclaiming “GAH! Coffee!” as soon as it was ‘his turn’ -- and, after writing everything down, Aggie gave us all a smile and said, “I’ll be right back with those,” before she turned away towards the kitchen.

I expected everybody to start talking about our creepy waitress that threatened to poison an undetermined number of people, but instead, Cartman said,

“So, Craig." I glanced up and watched him delicately fold his hands in front of him.

“What, asshole?” I asked when he didn’t elaborate.

Cartman held his hands up in surrender. “Calm down, Craig, I don’t see why you’re acting so defensive --”

“I’m not, just . . . don’t say something that you’ll regret,” I warned.

“I won’t,” Cartman assured. And I might’ve believed him, but then he said, “I just thought that -- for the sake of everybody's curiosity -- I’d bring up the fact that you’re a total fag now --”

I scowled darkly at him. “I’m not a --” I started to say, but then stopped short. Saying _that word_ again gave me a feeling akin to pissing on a picture of the prophet Mohammed, so I averted my eyes to my plate and said, “I’m not _that_.”

“But you’re dating a dude,” Stan said, and I shifted my glare up to him.

“That doesn’t mean I’m a _that_ ,” I said angrily. “It just means I’m gay.”

Jesus.

 _Fuck_ , dude.

That came out _way_ too blunt, even for me, and my body realized this before I did. In the end, I was a scarlet blushing mess, wishing that I _hadn’t_ just said that _that_ loud and _that_ emphatically.

“I mean, I . . . that came out . . . I didn’t mean it like --”

“Relax, dickhead,” Kenny said, an eye roll in his voice.

“Yeah, we knew you were gay this whole time,” Kyle said, resting his chin in his palm, his elbow upright on the table. “Literally nothing has changed.”

Those were the most beautiful words I’d ever heard in my entire life. _Literally nothing has changed_. Because, I don’t know if this is out of character, but I really, really fucking hate change, and just the thought of my entire life staying exactly as it was in that moment was the most intoxicating thought. I had my boyfriend, my asshole friends and Cartman, and I was getting good grades, I was happy.

And literally nothing had changed.

* * *

The rest of lunch went by okay. Wasn’t anything special. It was just like any other time all of us hung out together. There were short-lived fights, Cartman being Cartman, Kyle being Kyle, and an overabundance of sexual innuendos, courtesy of Kenny.

It was only when Tweek excused himself to the bathroom that something interesting happened. Maybe not _interesting_ , but suspicious. Because the second Tweek left, Clyde stood up and announced that he had to go, too. I narrowed my eyes at him, but ultimately let it go.

But then about five minutes passed. It was weird. They were gone too long. So I excused myself and followed after them. The second I entered the bathroom, and saw Tweek and Clyde standing at opposite ends of the bathroom, staring at each other, I felt a weird tension. Because they both looked very different then they had at the table; Tweek was shaking and trembling again, his hands gripping at the front of his shirt and his eyes blown wide open. He had his back pressed against the wall, like he was straining himself to be as far away from Clyde as he could.

And Clyde . . . even though Clyde was across the room, his body language was very . . . out of the ordinary when it came to Clyde. He had his arms folded over his chest, his hips resting against the counter by the sinks, and his posture was straight and tense. There was a blank expression on his face. Like, _me at my most apathetic_ blank.

They both looked over when they heard the door open, and Tweek let out a shriek. Clyde’s expression softened some, but he still looked weirdly . . . angry? I didn’t even know if _angry_ was the right word.

I quirked my eyebrows, glancing between the two of them, before making my way slowly to Tweek. He seemed the most distraught, and I also love the fuck out of him, so of course I went to him first. “Um. What’s going on?” I asked.

It took a few seconds for Tweek to answer me, which did nothing but make me worry. To try to coax some answers from him, I took both of Tweek’s hands in mine and eased them from the front of his shirt, but even then he didn’t calm down much.

When he did talk, his voice was shaking horrifically. “Craig, I . . . oh, _Jesus_ , Craig, I didn’t . . . I don’t --”

I knew right away what he was trying to do. He was trying to apologize. I could tell by how his eyes were staring at everything, except for me, at once. And how he was stuttering through what he wanted to say, and I glanced at Clyde, who was watching the two of us, an almost . . . apologetic? expression on his face. I wasn’t entirely sure what he was trying to do, and I couldn’t read him, but I was focused on Tweek too much to really pay much attention to him.  

“Stop it,” I said to Tweek. “We did this last night, we’re done with it.”

“But, _Craig_ , Clyde, he . . . I can’t . . . I don’t know what --”

Well, if Tweek wasn’t going to shut up at my _words_ , then I did something that I knew _would_ shut him up. I leaned towards him and kissed his temple gently. He froze, his grip on my hand resembling an iron choker and his face turning a violent shade of crimson. His eyes were wide and surprised as he stared at me.

“I said stop it,” I said sternly, ignoring the heat in my cheeks in favor of focusing on calming him down. “We did this last night. We’re _done_ with it. I don’t want to hear any more apologies. Okay?”

Tweek was quiet for a few seconds, before he nodded jerkily and said, his voice shaking, “GAH! Okay . . .”

“Good. Now, go back to the table, I asked the waitress to top off your coffee and it’s going to get cold.”

Tweek let out a weird whiny noise, so I gave him a smile and added,

“I’ll be there in a second. You’ll be fine, okay? I won’t be long.”

“NGH! Yeah, okay,” Tweek said, shifting his eyes to his feet as he left, his steps uneven and hurried.

When it was just Clyde and I, I gave Clyde a firm glare. “What the fuck were you two just talking about?”

Clyde quirked his lips off to the side and furrowed his eyebrows. “I didn’t mean to do . . . _that_. . . I was just trying to have the ‘best friend’ talk with him.”

I raised an eyebrow. “What the fuck is the ‘best friend’ talk?”

“You know. The best friend talk. The ‘you hurt him, I hurt you,’ talk --”

“Jesus, Clyde!” I said angrily. “I’m not twelve! Or a girl! And you’re not my dad! Or my mom! Or . . . whatever, I don’t fucking know, the point is, you had _no_ authority to do that!”

“You have no sense of self-preservation, you know that?” Clyde said back. “You spent an entire week in a constant state of inebriation, because Tweek left you! Do you know how hard it is to see someone like you in a state like that? It’s really fucking hard, dude! And I don’t want to see you like that again! I was just making sure Tweek was serious, that he wouldn’t fuck you over again!”

I felt some of my anger ebb away some. I . . . kind of understood where he was coming from. But I wanted it all to be over, so I gave up trying to fight against anyone involved, and said with a sigh, “Okay, Clyde. Okay. Just . . . Jesus, no more ‘best friend’ talks, okay? It’s all done and over with; Tweek and I forgot about it, Kenny and Butters forgot about it, it’s all forgotten about. Don’t bring it up again.”

Clyde nodded, his posture loosening into the classic Clyde slouch. We were quiet for a few seconds, before Clyde cleared his throat and said, “Do you dare me to lick the faucet?”

I grimaced, and turned away from him. “Go for it. But, in case you get some sort of disease, I’m not going to be a witness.”

Clyde groaned, but followed after me anyway. Him and I didn’t talk on the way back. When we neared the table and Tweek saw me, he straightened with a small smile and waved to me. I waved back, and caught Clyde’s eye, raising an eyebrow. If that dumbass didn’t put two and two together when he saw Tweek and I around each other, then it was his fault for being a dumbass. Because, now that I was aware of it, Tweek was very much in love with me, and I don’t even care if that sounds dick-ish, I knew it was true.

* * *

After lunch everybody just sort of waffled around town, trying to figure out what to do before everybody left. We had worked it out: Mom confirmed that she’d pick me up at the airport. I would’ve found some way to get Tweek to the airport, but Token and Clyde said they wanted to see me off. Token was going to drive Clyde, Wendy, Bebe, Tweek, and me to the airport, drop us off, and then drive back to South Park. The other car back to South Park was driven by Butters -- go fucking figure -- and he was taking Kenny, Kyle, Stan, and Cartman; Kenny and Butters said they wanted to see Tweek off, so that meant that everybody was going to see Tweek off, and he was, for some reason, weirdly nervous about it.

Also, because the transportation to and from South Park was planned apparently painstakingly carefully, Tweek and I had to sit in the far back of Token’s SUV with everybody’s bags. It was very uncomfortable and we had to keep from smacking into the sides of the car whenever Token made a sharp turn, but it was weirdly . . . fun, like a makeshift roller coaster, that was much more dangerous and held a higher risk of concussion.

After Token parked in the airport parking lot, Tweek and I emerged from the back of Token’s SUV and stretched out cramped limbs. I grabbed my backpack from the top of the pile, swung it over one shoulder, and then, before Tweek even had a chance to reach for it, I snatched his duffle bag away from him. “I’m carrying this,” I said blankly.

Tweek frowned at me, saying, “GAH! No, you’re not!” as he made a move to grab for it. I held it over his head so he couldn’t reach it, and smirked at the frustration on his face. “Give it to me, Craig! I can carry it by myself!”

“I know you can,” I said calmly. “But I’m your boyfriend and I want to.”

Tweek’s struggles slowed to a stop and he stared at me with narrowed eyes. “Why?”

I shrugged. “Because. I’m your boyfriend. And I want to.” I didn’t know how else to explain it, and Tweek didn’t ask anymore questions. He just turned his blushing, frowning face away and let it happen.

“Fine,” he grumbled, gripping the front of his shirt sheepishly.

I felt the corners of my mouth twitch upwards at the expression on his face, and held out my free hand for him to take. He mumbled something under his breath that I couldn’t understand, but took my hand anyway, and we walked through the front doors of the airport.

The entire way to Tweek’s gate, everybody said vague, half-hearted goodbyes, and, when we were standing in front of gate D14, I told them all to fuck off, and walked a little further with Tweek, for a last-minute just-us conversation.

I handed him his duffel bag, which he took with a smile. “Well . . . have a nice flight,” I said, rubbing the back of my neck awkwardly. I wasn’t exactly sure what to say; I mean, I was going to miss him a whole fucking lot, but I wasn’t really all that good at conveying how much it was going to suck being away from him for two and a half weeks.

“Thanks,” he said, putting his duffel bag on the airport floor. “Have a safe drive.”

“Thanks.”

There was an awkward lull into silence.

“Call me when you land, okay?” I said, looking at him, soaking up the sight of him, as I wouldn’t see his in-real-life face again until January.

“GAH! Okay,” he said with a nod, the tips of his cheeks turning a light pink. “Call me when you . . . get home?”

I grinned at his obvious grappling with the right response. “You’ll be on the plane when I do.”

“Oh,” he mumbled, gripping the front of his coat and tugging. “Well, uh --”

“Don’t worry, Tweek, I’ll be fine,” I said, ruffling his hair, which made him look up at me with a smile.

“Okay,” he said, agreeably.

I felt . . . _some_ eyes on Tweek and I, but I wasn't all that concerned, so, without taking a breath, I wrapped my arms around Tweek’s body tightly. He stiffened and shrieked, which I sighed at, because that drew even more attention to us, but I kept hold of him anyway. And I patted the back of his head gently when I felt his trembling arms wrap around my waist and squeeze me tightly.

“Don’t . . . just don’t . . . die or anything, okay?” I mumbled into his hair, smiling when he giggled.

“Okay, I’ll try,” he said, his voice laced with laughter. “And if you do something stupid again, and get yourself killed, I’m not going to your funeral.”

I pulled back and rolled my eyes just so he could see. “Thanks.” I had to give him credit: the Tweek that I met at the very beginning of the semester wouldn’t have been able to make a joke like that. He would’ve been scared at the idea of me dying. But he was learning that not everything needed to be panicked over, and that was probably the most admirable thing about him. His ability to overcome something that’d been ingrained in him his entire life.

He patted my back happily, before letting me go. “You’re welcome.”

I smiled at him, before I forced myself to realize that he still had a plane to catch, and my parents were going to be there, waiting for me, any second. “Well, I should let you . . . get on your plane, I guess,” I mumbled, taking an awkward step back.

Tweek’s face fell, but he nodded anyway. “Ugh. I keep forgetting. Going home. Away from you. For . . . ngh, for two and a half weeks.”

“Yeah, I know,” I said, giving him a reassuring smile.

He smiled back, and held eye contact with me for a few seconds, before his mouth popped open as if he just remembered something. “Oh! Before I forget, I have something to give you. Or, give _back_ to you.”

I watched him, curiously, as he knelt down to his duffle back, unzipped a side pouch, and rustled through it. He let out a little squeak when he found whatever he was looking for, and pulled a small, kind of circular object out that looked somewhat familiar, and --

“What the fuck, _you’re_ the one that took my flask?” I asked incredulously. He held it out for me to take, and I took it immediately. Even though I had no intention of using it for vodka anymore, as I’m sure I’ve stated before, I was extremely attached to that flask. It encompassed almost every single one of my feelings about high school, and it was good to have it back.

“Yeah,” Tweek said with a nod, watching carefully as I turned the flask over in my hands. “I cleaned it out and everything. It looked . . . special. I know it must’ve meant something to you, so I figured it’d be wrong to keep it from you. But you have to _promise_ me you won’t use it for . . . you know.”

“I won’t --”

“You have to _promise_.”

I was slightly taken aback by how stern Tweek’s voice was, and his eyebrows were set in stubborn determination.

“I promise,” I said with a firm nod, snaking it into my coat pocket.

He let out a breath. “Okay. Good.”

There was something about Tweek’s attitude in that moment that made me feel especially warm inside. Because he was treating me almost exactly like Nikiel had been treating me since the beginning of our friendship. It was weird when Nikiel did it, (it made me feel like a child), but I found that I actually really, really liked it when Tweek did it. I liked it when he worried about me, but I didn’t want to tell him that, because how the fuck do you admit something that weird to someone, so instead I ruffled his hair, revelling in his little giggle-laugh. “I hope you have a nice Christmas, Tweek.”

Tweek came down from his laughter, blinked a few times, and gave me a weird look. “Uh . . . I don’t celebrate Christmas.”

I stared at him, shocked. Not that he didn’t celebrate Christmas, but at the fact that I didn’t know something as important as that. Because even if it doesn’t sound like much -- after all, not celebrating a holiday isn’t all that big in and of itself -- it insinuated something much deeper. For example, he wasn’t obviously wasn’t Christian, or one of those atheists that still celebrate technically religious holidays. He didn’t strike me as Jewish, because I feel like he probably would’ve mentioned something about that, especially when he heard Cartman mercilessly teasing Kyle about it. So, instead of just guessing, I asked “What the fuck? Since when?”

But I guess he wasn’t too offended by my complete lack of knowledge of his religious beliefs, because he smiled. “Since fourth grade, man.”

“No shit? How come you never told me?” I asked.

“Well, there aren’t many people like me around here. I wasn’t embarrassed, but I didn’t really feel the need to say anything. I’m, uh . . . I’m Buddhist.” When I didn’t say anything, he looked away awkwardly. “Namaste, you know?”

I laughed. “So that’s what the meditation was about. Okay, that makes sense. Well, forget Christmas, then, have a nice whatever Buddhists do this time of year.”

He rolled his eyes. “Thanks.”

I nodded, giving him one last look, before I turned away to leave. I figured ripping the band-aid off as quickly as possible was a good idea. And besides, I’d gotten a hug from him, and my skin under my coat was still tingling from the feeling. It’d keep me over until I’d get home, and then I’d just have to wait from a text from Tweek, and then I could spend my entire holiday vacation glued to my phone.

But, before I could walk away, Tweek grabbed both of my arms hurriedly and said under his breath, “Just . . . hang on a second.” I focused my attention on him again, watching curiously as he glanced over at the entire South Park crew, who were obviously still watching us in enthused silence. There was a weird expression on his face -- somehow both nervous, excited, and . . . uncaring? Like he was planning on just letting loose for one second of his life to do . . . whatever he was about to do.

And then, to my entire being’s surprise, Tweek looked back at me, wrapped his fingers around the handles of my chullo, lifted up on his toes, and kissed me right on the lips in front of everyone. I jolted, almost pulling away, but he had a vice grip on me, and the way his lips felt against mine was so nice that I didn’t want to push it away. It was going to be awhile before I’d get to feel them again, anyway, so I was going to give myself the moment.

My eyes were half lidded as I watched his closed eyes, squeezed shut in concentration. It wasn’t anything intense, no tongues, our mouths were closed, the only other part of our bodies touching besides our lips were the backs of Tweek’s fingers that brushed my cheeks periodically, and we were both completely silent. My eyes flickered shut, but as soon as they were officially closed, Tweek pulled back with a soft smacking sound, and he held close to me for a few more seconds, before letting me go.

I stared at him, reaching a hand to my tingling lips and touching them in shock. It wasn’t the first time Tweek had kissed me when I wasn’t expecting it, but it _was_ the first time it had happened in broad daylight, in front of other people, when it felt painfully -- or, well, wrong word, not painfully, but _obviously_ real. His entire face was scarlet, and there was an uneasy, but undeniably satisfied smile on his face, and he glanced up at me shyly with his big, hazel eyes.

“‘Bye, Craig.”

I cleared my throat a few times, shutting my mouth tightly, before opening it again and saying, “Yeah . . . yeah, ‘bye, Tweek.” I cringed outwardly when my voice cracked, and he smiled widely at me.

The fucking adorable asshole.

We just stared at each other for a few seconds, before Tweek took a few side-steps away from me, and waved sheepishly. I waved back, and sighed softly when he turned away, and walked in the direction of his gate. It sucked to see him go, especially because I knew he was going back to his parents, who I (reasonably, I think) hated with a hot fiery passion that far outweighed anything else I had ever felt. Well, almost, but it was close, because Tweek’s parents were the worst. They were horrible, horrible people that I had no desire to meet ever in my life. But I knew I would probably have to, at some point. Because I had planned to stay with Tweek for as long as Tweek wanted to stay with me, and, from how he talked and acted around me, that was going to be a really, really long time.

And once he was out of sight, I closed my eyes tightly. I was a little afraid of turning around and facing everybody, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to just avoid them forever, so, very slowly and reluctantly, I turned to look at them. Not one of them didn’t have a smirk on their stupid faces. Fuck, even _Token_ was grinning obnoxiously.

I cleared my throat, and tried to bring my monotone voice into something resembling a threat, but it fell flat due to how shaky it still was. “Nobody says anything.”

“Aww, Craig, it’s real sweet of ‘ya to kiss your boyfriend goodbye,” Butters cooed, resting his head on Kenny’s shoulder and smiling widely at me. I don’t think he intended to embarrass me, but he totally fucking did, because his words spurred the other guys’ reactions.

And they were not . . . favorable.

“Well, now that Tweek and Craig final admit that they’re total fags, all us other fags can go on a triple date,” Cartman said diplomatically, wrapping an arm around Kyle and pulling him into his side.

“Gee, a triple date sure sounds fun!” Butters exclaimed, lifting his head to nod enthusiastically.

“As long as Craig and Tweek keep their tongues to themselves,” Kyle said with a snort. The statement was so strange coming from his mouth -- I would’ve expected that from Kenny, or Cartman, or even Clyde on his more annoying days -- that I almost couldn’t get mad at it.

Almost.

My blood started to boil unpleasantly in my veins, the heat in my cheeks getting warmer the more time I stood there, my emotions uncomfortably exposed, but, before I had the chance to tell them to shut the fuck up, Kenny talked right over me, saying with an annoying smirk on his face, “Fuck yeah, I say we go to the Olive Garden --”

“Ugh, shut _up_ , Kenny,” I said angrily, folding my arms over my chest so that I wouldn’t punch him in the face. I knew he was referencing that one day that we actually went there, and how Tweek had a really shitty time. They were pissing me off royally, and what I wouldn’t have given to have Tweek standing next to me, at least to share the brunt of their teasing.

Stan rolled his eyes. “Oh, stop complaining, Craig.”

“Yeah, now you can suck Tweek off whenever you want to, what’s the problem?” Cartman asked, his voice an obnoxious, slow drawl.

Theoretically, there wasn’t one. My life was going pretty good. Exponentially better that it had been just two days before that. But my relationship with Tweek was a . . . sensitive subject, for some reason. The fact that I was openly in love with someone made me feel a brand of vulnerability that I hadn’t felt in a long time, and I wasn’t too sure I liked being mocked about it.

So I growled angrily, ready to snap back at whatever taunt they had, but it was then that I caught sight of my parents, waving at me with blank expressions on their faces from across the airport lobby. I sighed in relief. “Oh, thank God,” I mumbled, the muscles that had clamped up due to the nature of our conversation letting up. “Well, assholes, looks like I gotta go,” I said, forcing my voice to it’s monotone. “As always, it sucked royally to see you all, and you can go fuck yourselves.” I flipped them off, ignoring their jeers and snickering, and hurried in my parent’s direction.

I had never been happier to see my family, ever.

It probably took forever for me to get to them, and I could still hear the fading laughter of the other guys, but I tried my best to ignore it.

I flipped my family off collectively when I reached them, and said, “Hey.”

My parents and Tricia all flipped me off back, but I actually got a smile out of my mom, and a smirk out of my sister. My dad stayed as blank faced as ever, but I was a little too caught up in my thoughts to care.

“Hi, Craig,” Tricia said, walking over to me and hesitated, before holding out an awkward hand.

I stared down at it, and then looked up at her with a confused eyebrow. “What?”

She dropped her arm again and returned her face to it’s normal flat expression. “Well, I was looking for a handshake, but nevermind.”

I rolled my eyes, adjusting the strap of my backpack on my shoulder and ignored her.

“Are we leaving now?” I asked flatly, looking between my parents, trying to guess which one was going to answer me.

Turned out it was my dad. “Yeah. I have to work early tomorrow morning. Your mother hasn’t made dinner yet, either.”

“Oh.”

My parents turned to leave, so I started to follow them, but I was stopped in my tracks when I heard Clyde’s voice call out, “‘Bye, Craig!” and, when I looked over my shoulder, he was waving at me with his entire arm, a wide smile on his face. The other guys were waving, too, but none of them came even close to matching Clyde’s unabashed excitement.

I flipped him off -- I flipped them all off -- keeping my face firmly blank. Without waiting for a response, I turned away, following my family out of the front doors of the lobby.

As we walked through the parking lot, my sister turned to me, her eyes narrowed, and she asked, almost accusingly, “Did you actually make friends?”

I shook my head, ignoring the condescending nature of her voice. “Old friends. From South Park.”

Mom turned around at that and raised an eyebrow. “From South Park? Who?”

I rolled my eyes, adjusting the strap of my backpack on my shoulder. “Pretty much everybody. Clyde, Token. Stan, Kyle, Kenny, and that asshole Cartman.” I didn’t expect my parents to have any idea what I was talking about, and it didn’t seem like my dad did, because he just kept walking with that forever-blank expression his face. My sister didn’t look like she cared enough to respond, but my mom actually seemed interested.

“I remember them,” she said flatly, but thoughtfully.

She didn’t elaborate further than that -- though I didn’t really expect her to -- and we all walked in silence to my parents’ 2012 Ford Fusion. I was anticipating a very awkward car ride home; I was so used to Tweek’s prattling about conspiracy theories and shit, (not to mention the dumb little arguments we would get into about literally everything), so complete silence for almost two solid hours was probably going to actually make me go insane.

And as I climbed into the backseat of the car, clicking my seatbelt and waiting for someone to say something, my immediate thought was,

_Fuck, I miss Tweek already._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this chapter happened out of necessity, all the itty bitty shit that had to happen, happened. Not a whole lot of progression, I know, and, for a chapter with little progression, it's really long, but trust me, it all had to happen anyway. Might as well get it out of the way, I guess?
> 
> Anyway, thanks for reading, and I'm sorry again about the wait!


	22. The Opposite of Coming Out

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, so guess who's back with two chapters in one day!
> 
> Don't know if this is exciting for any of you, but it's pretty darn exciting for me! I'm happy to be back in business!
> 
> ***Also, there is a brief rape mention in this chapter. No physical acts, memories, or descriptions. There is a background, layered threat, however, so viewer discretion advised. You'll know what I mean if you feel comfortable enough to continue. ***
> 
> Also, also, I edited this, because I read through my work every once in awhile, to make sure it's consistent before I continue, and I realized that there was a couple errors, so I've fixed them.
> 
> Thank you for reading!

The longest car ride I’d ever been on was when I moved to Nebraska from Colorado. The move was expensive enough, no fucking way were we going to be able to afford flying. It was around six and a half hours, and Clyde texted me the entire way there. Just stupid little, _I’m going to miss you so much_ ’s and _Why did your parents have to make you move_ ’s, and shit like that. I humored him, and we did end up texting for a few weeks after the big move, but our best friendship eventually faded into a distant acquaintanceship, until we stopped speaking for good. Well, until college.

But, despite the fact that the longest car ride I’d ever been through kind of sucked ass, I didn’t mind long car rides. Actually I really _liked_ long car rides. I liked looking out the window and watching the scenery whizz by too fast for me to really process, and I liked shoving earbuds in my ears and listening to my own music without anyone complaining or telling me my tastes sucked balls. Long car rides were a great way to let your mind just shut off for awhile. Your one distraction, really, was music or the view. My family pretty much hated talking to each other, so we never really did that. It was nice. Comforting.

But. Not that car ride. The further we drove, the further I was away from Tweek, and that didn’t sit right with me. But the upside was that, because my family was strikingly similar to me, the first half of the car ride was spent in complete silence, which I very much appreciated.

I was feeling . . . solemn.

At the halfway point of the car ride, though, _Left Hand Suzuki Method_ dimmed, and, when I clicked my phone screen on to see who had texted me. It was Tweek and I felt a smile come to my face just at the prospect of reading a text from him. I paused Gorillaz, and read the message from him:

_Just getting on the plane now_

And then immediately after, I got another one from him:

_I love you_

Before I had the chance to blush, another came:

_I figured I’d tell you just in case my plane crashes and I die instantly in a fiery explosion_

And then another:

_Oh Jesus I hope that doesn’t happen!!!!_

I smiled, feeling my cheeks heating up. I texted back:

_You’ll be fine, I promise. Don’t forget to text me when you land, I’ll be waiting_

And hesitated for only a moment before adding:

_And I love you, too_

I kind of figured that Tweek and I wouldn’t say _I love you_ too often. At least, _I_ wouldn’t. Well, I’d probably say it back if he said it to me, just because it would feel wrong if I didn’t. But I was too weird about those kind of emotions to _initiate_ anything.

But it was nice to hear, anyway.

I jumped when I heard my dad say suddenly, “Craig? Your face is all red.” I looked up, and made eye contact with him through the rear view mirror.

I cleared my throat and said awkwardly, staring out the window at the rapidly-changing scenery, “Yeah, well,” without giving any more of an explanation. Like I’d ever tell my mildly homophobic dad that I was blushing because my very-male boyfriend had texted me that he loved me.

But my family didn’t really seem to care all that much because they dropped the inquisition quickly enough.

“You never told me, how did your semester go?” Mom asked, looking at me through the passenger’s side mirror. “Did you pass all your classes?”

I shrugged. “My grades haven’t come in yet. I should get them in the mail sometime at the end of the month.”

“Well, you should know if you passed them or not,” Dad said gruffly. “Did you know the stuff on your exams?”

I frowned. “Yeah, I did. I know I passed them, I just don’t know what grade I’ll get. The exams aren’t the only thing they take into account.”

“Did you do your homework, and . . . participate in class?” Mom asked. The way she said the last part, it was like she thought it was the dumbest thing for them to grade you on. Which I totally agreed with, some of us don’t like talking ever, so the professor shouldn’t give a fuck whether we do it or not. As long as we know what’s going on.

“Yeah. Well, not the last one, but yeah.”

“You’ve gotta learn to speak up,” Dad said, in his monotone voice. “You can’t just sit there and pussy-foot your way through life. You’ll never be successful if you do.”

I rolled my eyes. That was the most basic, dried-up Dad-philosophy I’d ever heard. And, like every time Dad tried to give me ‘advice’, I didn’t give a fuck, and didn’t listen to him. And didn’t answer.

* * *

My house wasn’t very big. It wasn’t very small, but it wasn’t very big, either. There was one bathroom, and then a half bathroom by the kitchen. I know, weird fucking place for it, but it was helpful if you were in a fix. We didn’t have a mudroom or whatever, and just kept our shoes in the hallway leading to the living room, which was the first room in the house. Of all the rooms in the house, the living room was definitely the coolest. It wasn’t anything special, but the entire home improvement budget was dedicated almost exclusively to the living room, so the couches were big and very comfortable, Mom and Dad both had armchairs right next to each other on the side, and we had not one, but two couches, so Tricia and I didn't have to sit anywhere close to each other. We had a decent sized TV on a wooden stand at the front of the room, and, because my dad liked old, traditional shit, he had a record player in the corner.

But, because the living room was fucking sweet, the kitchen and dining room . . . weren’t.

So, after we got all situated, Mom just fucking gave up on cooking and ordered a couple pizzas. She tried to play it off like it was a special occasion, but I knew it was because she gave up.

After the pizza arrived, we all mutually decided to eat in the living room. Generally speaking, we did eat in the dining room on most nights, but, I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this before, Tuckers moved in units. We all just sort of migrated towards certain concepts or ideas or decisions without really talking about it with everybody else involved. Maybe it was because we were all from South Park, and had a fucked up sense of communication, but it worked. It meant we didn’t have to say anything, and, if Tuckers are good at one thing, it’s saying nothing.  

Well. Usually.

Mom broke out the fancy paper plates, and pulled the cork out of a new bottle of wine, pouring some in a glass for herself and some for my dad. The TV was turned on to Law and Order SVU, (a show that was _definitely_ not suitable for dinner entertainment), and we all watched in disinterested silence.

A commercial came on, and, instead of enjoying the, um, _hilarious?_  Geico commercial, Mom decided that speaking was necessary. “So, did you end up getting along with your roommate?” she asked, placing her wine glass back on the table beside her arm chair. “From what I heard from him he didn’t really seem like your type.”

Did I end up getting along with my roommate. I’d say yes.

But before I could say anything at all, my dad said, “From what you heard? You met Craig’s roommate?”, turning to my mom with mild surprise on his face. Well, as much surprise as his facial muscles were capable of. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Mom shrugged. “Well, I didn’t really _meet_ him. I just heard him. He was hiding under his bed when I came in.”

There was a beat of silence before my dad asked, deadpanned, “Hiding under his bed? Why?”

Mom looked at me, as if unsure really why he was actually under there in the first place. I answered for her. “Tweek gets --”

“Your roommate’s name is _Tweek_?” Dad interrupted incredulously, eyeing me like he thought I was lying.

I rolled my eyes. Nobody ever believed me when I told them Tweek’s name, but I kind of figured Dad would, because he was born in South Park, where weird names were just the tip of the iceberg. He was friends with a guy named _Jimbo_ back then. He lost contact with pretty much everyone after we moved, but the fact still stands that he was friends with that gun-obsessed asshole for years.

“Yes. He gets nervous around new people, so, to avoid meeting my mom, he hid under his bed.”

My mother laughed quietly. “I’m sorry you got stuck with such a spazzy roommate,” she said. “I know you were hoping for someone normal.”

I frowned again. “He’s not that bad. We actually got really close this semester. He watches Red Racer, too, and hates everybody. Even though he’s a twitchy spaz, we’re . . . actually kinda alike.” I shrugged, pulling the plug on my rambling when I realized that I was probably being too much. “He’s my best friend.” I figured I would keep out everything that had transpired the night before, and the morning of. Not exactly dinner conversation. Or any conversation you would ever have with your parents.

Dad looked at me steadily, quietly. I couldn’t read his face, but I could tell that he was about to say something. He had that contemplative look in his eyes that I didn’t see very often, but was around him enough to recognize it.

“Craig, you’re not gay, are you?”

I sighed, my eyes dropping to my plate. I should’ve known that that was the conclusion he’d jump to, and I should’ve watched how I talked about Tweek around him. I mean, he wasn’t wrong, I was probably as gay as a guy could be, but that was what he assumed whenever I talked even remotely highly of any male figure of any kind.

I had a brief existential crisis, or whatever the fuck it was, trying to figure out how to answer that question. I didn’t expect to have to come out to my dad so quickly after realizing. Part of me wanted to, just so I didn’t have to do it later, but I just wasn’t fucking ready to deal with his ‘casual’ homophobia. I’d learned from several other people -- Kyle, Tweek, Butters -- that a lot of gay kids had to do a lot of prep work before coming out to anybody, and I hadn’t had the time. Sure, I didn’t give a fuck about what anybody had to say about anything in my life at all, but it was surprisingly hard to get the words out, so I found myself saying,

“No, Dad. I’m not gay.”

I grimaced in my mind. Tweek was going to hate me.

“That’s good,” he said with an approving nod. “I was worried that you spending so much time around another boy your age would . . . do things to you.”

I shook my head, keeping my eyes on my plate. I felt my chest constricting at his words. I was Craig Tucker, dammit, and I wasn’t used to caring about things like that, and the fact that my dad was so touchy and hesitant to accept a part of my life that made me actually _happy_. . . it hurt. More than I was willing to admit, and I’m surprised I’m admitting it now.

“No, it’s not doing anything to me,” I said, the words coming almost without permission. “Tweek’s just a friend.”

That was such an out-right, blatant lie that I was surprised I kept my voice even. I mean, I was a really good liar, but I’d never had to lie about something as serious as being gay and having a boyfriend before.

Dad grumbled, cutting his chicken into smaller pieces. “Good. Not that there’s anything wrong with it. They deserve rights and all that, just keep in the bedroom.”

I frowned moodily, picking at my pizza crust irritably. I mean, I loved my parents -- usually -- but sometimes I just felt that maybe having Clyde’s dad, or, better yet, _Token’s_ parents, would be so much better. Because Token’s parents supported everybody’s personal choices like that, (gay, straight, bi, trans, they cared just about as much as I do, only they were nicer about it), and Clyde’s dad just loved everybody, so he would’ve probably just gushed happily, hugged me, and been done with it. I had no idea what Dad was going to do when I finally made my way out of the closet officially.

I was nervous just thinking about it.

“Well, Tweek’s gay,” I blurted out, without thinking. I felt my cheeks heat up, but I tried to force the blush away. I wasn’t entirely sure why I said that. Maybe I was testing the waters to see how Dad would react to an actual gay person, rather than this concept of a gay person that he referenced whenever the topic came up. Maybe I was subconsciously preparing myself to come out by outing my boyfriend, maybe I was curious as to what my dad’s response was going to be in regards to my roommate being gay, especially when my dad was very . . . pro-separation, it seemed. I didn’t know; all I knew was that the words were out, and there was nothing I could do to stop the fallout.

I glanced nervously up at my dad, and chewed on my bottom lip when I saw he was looking at me weird, his bite of chicken frozen in front of his tight-lipped mouth.

“You’re . . . living with one of them?” he asked, confusion and disdain laced in his words. He lowered his fork. “And that doesn’t bother you?”

I frowned at him. “No, it doesn’t bother me. He’s just a person.”

“Well, be careful around him,” Dad said, shaking his head. “They have a way of making you like them.”

I had no idea what that meant, nor did I really want to know what that meant, so I looked back down and kept my mouth shut.

* * *

The only thing Mom had prepared for my return, really, was a pie for dessert. It was okay. She was never the best cook, but she didn’t burn everything, so we all -- my dad, my sister, and me -- decided not to complain. I was still feeling awkward and shit from our ‘gay’ conversation during dinner, and I really just wanted to be alone to gather my thoughts. My mind was much noisier than it normally was. Another thing to blame on Tweek.

So, when everything was eaten, I just said goodnight and went up to my room. My family didn’t ask questions -- not like I expected them to -- and they didn’t try to stop me, so I figured it was okay. Tricia would come to my room every once in awhile when we were younger, just to bug me, but, now that she was thirteen or whatever the hell she was, she wouldn’t have the desire to take time out of her night just to instigate a fight. My parents never came to my room unless they had to, so I knew I was free for the rest of the night.

There were three bedrooms, all on the second floor. I climbed the stairs to my bedroom, backpack slung over one shoulder, and I pushed the door open for the first time since I’d left for school in September.

I tossed my backpack on the floor next to my dresser, and stretched, taking in my surroundings. It was exactly like I remembered: the walls were like a dull white color, but that didn’t mean my room was bright at all. I had navy blue curtains that I always kept drawn, so it was actually super dark in there. I had a few posters on my walls: one of, of course, Red Racer, another of the alignment of the planets, a very descriptive Periodic Table that had, like pictures and shit on it, and a fourth that Scarface. I had never seen Scarface, and wasn't even really a big Al Pacino fan, but my dad had the poster from when he was in college, and it looked badass, so I kept it. 

But probably my favorite part of my room was my ceiling. At the hardware store down the road from my house, they sell glow in the dark paint. (Some of you may already know where I’m going with this.) I poured over countless astronomy books and studied as many video lectures on our galaxy as I could, and I painted the Milky Way Galaxy onto my ceiling with this awesome glow-in-the-dark paint.

It took me, like, a six months to finish it, in between doing school, getting drunk and high, and sleeping. It was fucking sweet. It was probably the coolest thing I’d ever done. And, because it was high fucking quality paint, (it was a gift from my grandma, who was loaded), like, I’m talking fucking industrial, it would be tens of years before it needed to be touched up. And, unlike glow-in-the-dark stars, I wouldn’t have to worry about it falling off.

I was in the middle of reminiscing when I heard a ping come from my pocket. I quickly pulled my phone out, hoping that it was Tweek informing he’d landed safely, but it was a text from fucking Clyde.

_Dude so now that were friends again and evrything does that mean i can text u now_

I rolled my eyes, and texted back,

_As long as you’re not a dumbass about it, and actually have something important to say, then go for it, I guess._

I let my thumb hover over the letters, before typing out a quick,

_And congrats, I guess, on scoring a date with Bebe._

because I’d remember I had congratulated him yet. I remembered, back in South Park, he had the biggest crush on Bebe Stevens. They had dated once in elementary school, but it turned out she was just using him to buy her shoes from the shoe store his dad managed in the mall. I kind of really hated her for awhile, but she tamed a little bit through the years. I remember everybody had a bit of a crush on Bebe in grade school, but she had blossomed in middle school, and the boys really really liked her. I mean, I never did, but . . . well, at the time I didn’t really know why. I thought she just wasn’t my type. And it’s not like I was wrong.

I’d been told that Bebe was a total whore senior year, but that she’d calmed down again, like I did, once she realized that college was actually, you know, important. For your, you know. _Future_. That was something I admired, so I decided she was okay in my books.

And then she had grown into the blonde-haired, blue-eyed, big-chested, full-lipped girl of Clyde’s dreams, and they looked . . . good together. I guess. Whatever.

I immediately got an ecstatic text back, about how surprised he was that I was paying attention, and that he was so happy, and then he told me all about their first date, and I just . . . I didn’t care. Like, at all. And after awhile I just stopped reading his texts because they started to get really descriptive, and I started to doubt their reliability.

But I didn’t turn my phone off.

* * *

Two hours later brought me to nine o’clock at night, and I still hadn’t hear anything from Tweek. I scrolled through the recommended section on YouTube, trying to find another video that fit my weird mood of disappointed and anxious, and I ended up watching a video that talked about what would happen if a human was born in space. It was weirdly dark and depressing, which was good, because that was the mood I was going for.

You know, I was a little irritated that I hadn’t heard from Tweek, but I was mostly worried. Tweek was always very precise about timing; he didn’t like being late, he didn’t like keeping people waiting, he didn’t like missing out on things that he’d be able to experience had he been on time. He was prompt as fuck, and I didn’t like that he hadn’t answered me yet.

Despite the weird feeling in my gut, I resolved that I was going to give him another half hour before I texted him myself. I figured this was a good enough time frame.

* * *

Half an hour came and went, and I still hadn’t heard from Tweek. So, with a huff, I pulled my phone out and texted him a simple,

_You get home okay?_

before tossing my phone onto my bedside table.

I passed the time by numbing my mind with the mind-numbing violence of GTA.

Still nothing from Tweek.

* * *

I went to sleep at about midnight, which was a lot earlier than normal, but still way later than anybody else in my deadbeat town. Before I shut my lights off, I sent Tweek one last text that said,

_I’m going to sleep, but text me whenever you get this, okay?_

You know, I was worried that I was being clingy and attached, and that maybe giving Tweek some space would make him feel less . . . trapped, I guess, (if that was how he even felt, he never mentioned it, and I trusted Tweek to tell me if I was making him uncomfortable), but I ignored that feeling, simply because that wasn’t just me texting him, asking him why he was ignoring me. I wasn’t being Clyde. I was repeatedly texting him because he told me that he’d text me when he landed so I knew he got home okay. That meant that something was stopping him from texting me back, and I refused to think any more on the subject, lest I lose my fucking head.

* * *

I woke to a faint vibrating noise.

At first I thought it was just a part of my dream, which had immediately escaped my memory the second my eyes opened, but then I realized it was coming from my phone, sitting on my bedside table and buzzing against the wood. I groaned, rubbing my eyes with my hands as I glared at the back of my phone, trying to decide if it was worth it to answer it.

The more I let it buzz away, the more I realized that it might actually be something important, so I huffed, and reached forward, pressing the talk button and lifting it to my ear. “Hello?”

“ _GAH! CRAIG! AHH!_ ”

I jolted at the sudden screeching in my ear. “Tweek?”

“ _GAH! NGH! Oh, God!_ ”

I sat up immediately, all desire to sleep leaving me. “What happened, Tweek? Is everything okay?”

“I’m sorry I didn’t text you earlier, it’s just that a lot of stuff happened and I didn’t know how to -- I mean, Mom and Dad were . . . I just -- GAH! -- I didn’t _mean_ to --”

I let out a breath, finally getting over my initial fear that he was hurt. He was panicking, clearly, but there was nothing in his voice that suggested he was physically hurt, and I was going to take that. “Tweek’s, it’s okay,” I said, trying to calm him down.

“ _No, it’s_ not _, Craig, MY PARENTS ASKED IF I’M GAY!_ ”

I sighed again, relaxing back against my pillow in a half-upright position. “Okay, Tweek. Tell me what happened.”

“ _My parents asked if I’m gay, and I told them . . . oh, Jesus, Craig, I’m sorry, don’t hate me --_ ”

A small smile picked at the corner of my mouth, even though there really wasn’t anything to smile about, (I was just happy to hear his voice), and I stared at my dark blue comforter. “I won’t hate you, Tweek. I swear. What happened?”

“ _I-I . . . I told them . . . I told them no.._.”

I frowned at his shaky voice. “Are you okay?”

“ _Am I_ okay _?!_ ” Tweek screeched. “ _Why are you asking if I’m_ okay _?_ ”

My frown deepened. “Because you sound like you’re not, and I’m trying to help.”

“ _Shouldn’t you be pissed at me?!_ ”

I pulled the phone away from my ear, and stared at the earpiece in shock. I got over my shock quickly enough, and shook my head, saying back, “No? Why would I be?”

“ _Because you and I . . . you’re . . . we . . . I’ve been trying -- trying to be . . . honest, with you and -- and everybody else, and since you’re my_. . .” There was a pause, before he continued. “ _Boyfriend ._. .”

Tweek drew out the word, almost as if he were unsure, but also like he was trying to savor the two syllables as much as possible. I didn’t blame him. We’d been dating for a day and it still felt unreal sometimes.

“Boyfriend,” I said firmly, nodding at nothing.

He let out a long, relieved breath, before he continued. “ _And if you had to come out . . . if your parents asked you . . . you’d say yes, right? Because you don’t care about anything, and it wouldn’t matter to you, because_ \--”

“Tweek,” I interrupted, running a hand down my face. “The same thing happened to me today. My parents asked me . . . I was talking about you, because they asked me about my roommate, and I guess I . . .” I swallowed again. “Talked too highly of you? Because whenever I’ve ever talked highly of any guy my age, my dad always asks if I’m gay. I’ve always told him no, because I figured I was telling the truth, but . . . when he asked tonight, I _still_ told him no.”

The line went dead for a few long, totally fucking unbearable seconds.

“You still there, Tweek?”

“ _GAH! Yeah . . . I’m still here._ ”

“And you heard me?”

“ _Yeah._ ”

“Does that make you feel better?”

Another pause. “ _I guess so._ ”

“Are you sure?”

“ _I’m sure._ ”

I smiled. “You swear?”

Tweek let out a breathy laugh, and despite everything, I found myself laughing at the sound. “ _I swear. You worry too much._ ”

“You make me worry.”

Tweek’s end went quiet again. “ _I don’t mean to_.”

I smiled, turning on my side and looking out my window at the unusually clear sky. “I know you don’t. But I do anyway. You’re my . . . you’re my boyfriend, Tweek.” I felt my heart flutter at my own words. He’d been my boyfriend for one whole day and it still felt strange to say out loud. “That’s what boyfriends do.”

Tweek laughed nervously. “ _They worry?_ ”

“All the time. It never stops.”

“ _Boyfriends do_?”

I grinned, amused by the fact that he felt the need to keep saying. “Yeah, boyfriends do. Especially if they’re boyfriends with little balls of anxiety, like you.”

I could see the scowl in the scoff that followed my words. “ _Shut up, Craig_ \--”

I smirked. “I’m serious. Spazzes like you make iron-hearted douchebags like me worry constantly.”

“ _I’m not a spaz, and you’re not an iron-hearted douchebag, asshole!_ ”

A pleasant tingle rang up my spine at his words. “I’m not an iron-hearted douchebag, but I’m an asshole?”

And I guess Tweek realized how dumb that sounded, because he hesitated, before he laughed lightly. “ _Yeah. Exactly. There’s a difference._ ”

“And the difference is?”

“ _You can reverse being an iron-hearted douche bag, but an asshole is who you are forever_.”

I laughed, pulling my blanket more firmly around my body. My room could get pretty cold at night. “Thanks, Tweek. I really appreciate that.”

“ _Any time, uh, boyfriend_.”

Jesus, he had no idea what he was doing to my heart. I was probably going to die by the time I was twenty-seven because of him. But, before I could say anything else, my bedroom door opened out of fucking nowhere, and I jumped, looking behind me to see my mom, rubbing her eyes and yawning.

“What’s wrong? I can hear you talking from my bedroom.”

“Oh,” I said, sitting up and staring at her with wide eyes. _Fuck, fuck, fuck, I’d been caught talking to my boyfriend in the middle of the night by someone who didn’t even know I was gay_. “Sorry.”

“Who are you talking to?”

“Uh . . . no one. Just . . . myself,” I said, trying to pretend like my voice wasn’t shaky.

Mom seemed to have snapped awake at my words, like she fucking knew what was happening.

And I guess she did, because she adjusted the belt of her green robe and leaned against my doorway. “You’re talking to yourself? Since when do you talk to yourself?”

I frowned at her. “Since when do you barge into my room without knocking?”

She studied me curiously, and, for a few seconds I considered just hanging up on Tweek without saying goodbye to avoid all the shit being _actually_ caught, but I knew that that probably would’ve just deterred Tweek from ever calling of his own free will again, so I just hoped he would hang on until Mom left.

When she finally did say something, her monotone voice was somehow both accusing and amused. “You’re talking to Tweek, aren’t you?”

My frown turned quickly to a scowl. I tried as fucking hard as I could to keep the panic off of my face and out of my words when I spat out, “It’s, like, three in the morning, why would I be talking to Tweek?”

She shrugged, righting herself again and turning around like she was getting ready to leave. “I can’t think of anybody _else_ you would be talking to. He’s your . . . best friend, after all.”

She turned away after that, and I didn’t release my scowl until her annoyingly indifferent face was gone, before I turned back to my phone and put it to my ear again.

“You still there, Tweek?”

“ _Yeah, is everything okay?_ ”

I nodded, even though I knew he could see me. “Everything’s fine. Just my mom came in because she heard me talking. Apparently, I woke her up. I didn’t realize how thin the walls are here.”

“ _GAH! EHH! Oh,_ fuck _, I’m sorry, dude, I totally forgot, it’s like three in the morning, and I called you without even_ thinking _! Jesus_ Christ --”

“Tweek, I don’t mind,” I interrupted him in as soothing a voice as I figured I was capable of. “You had a problem, you needed help, you came to me. That’s also what boyfriends do. I’m happy you have me to come to when you need an ear. Because sometimes all I need is a mouth. It works out pretty good, if you ask me.”

There was a long pause on Tweek’s end, longer than I knew was customary, even for a serious conversation like the one we were having. And all he said when he spoke again was, “ _You know, Craig, you’re the best boyfriend ever._ ”

My cheeks heated up immediately and I laughed awkwardly. “I don’t know about _that_ \--”

“ _No, you are,_ ” Tweek said emphatically. “ _You’re a great best friend and an even better boyfriend_.”

“We’ve only been dating for a day, Tweek --”

“ _And you’ve made me feel better in that one day than I’ve felt my whole life before I met you._ ”

I had no idea how to respond to that. Because how the _fuck_ are you supposed to respond to that?! “Uh . . . thanks,” I said lamely, but I guess Tweek didn’t mind my brief lapse of coherency, because he did his little giggle-laugh and said, " _Your welcome. Oh, and by the way, this is called the_ honeymoon phase _. I heard Kenny talking about it. It's gonna be like six months of non-stop romance._ "

I grimaced, but chuckled. "Gross."

" _Well, I'm not going to let you get out of it!_ " Tweek exclaimed, laughter lacing his words. " _You have the best boyfriend in the world, don't waste the honeymoon phase being your normal asshole self!_ "

I smirked at the moon. "I'm not good with romance, Tweek, so this is either going to be the weirdest six months, or the most awkward six months, of your life. Are you ready?"

" _Bring it on, dick_ ," Tweek said with a giggle. 

I laughed, resting my cheek in my palm and burrowing deeper into my mattress. God, he was so fucking adorable. And God, what I wouldn't have given to have him in bed with me, so I could hold him into my chest, and show him the stars and tell him about space and the universe. That would make me sooo happy. 

But before I could verbalize any of that, Tweek sucked in this short breath, but didn't immediately say anything. There was another beat of silence, longer than before, and there was some . . . weird about it. It wasn't your normal silence, somehow. I couldn't explain it. I was about to ask him what was wrong, when he beat me to the punch, and said, his voice just barely above a whisper. “ _Wait_. . .  _Don’t hang up, okay? My dad’s outside my door._ ” And his words weren’t anything particularly conversational; it actually kind of sounded like he was scared.

And I could guess why. My hands balled into fists again, and I narrowed my eyes at the moon. Why Tweek’s dad would go to Tweek’s room at three in the morning was beyond me. And I mean, my mom came into my room, but that was different. My mom didn’t have a habit of being an abusive, manipulative asshole to her own son. I was willing to drive all the way to Denver to punch Tweek's dad in the nose if he was fucking with him, which he _more_ than likely was. But I let out a breath to calm myself down and said, “Okay.”

He didn’t say anything, but, after a few seconds, I heard shouts from . . . somewhere, but it was hard to make out. “Tweek?” I said in a panic. “Tweek, what happened, are you okay?”

I didn’t get an answer, and my heart was beating out of my fucking chest.

“Tweek, answer your fucking phone, what’s happening --”

Again, I didn’t get an answer, but I could distinctly make out Tweek’s voice screaming, “ _OH GOD, NO, WHAT ARE WE GONNA DO?!_ ”

“Tweek, Jesus Christ, what --”

And fucking _finally_ Tweek answered me, and it was a very loud shout, so full of panic that I felt scared _for_ him.

“ _Craig, oh my God, there’s someone outside_ \--”

I winced away from the receiver, but ignored the sudden ringing in my ear. “Okay,” I said as calmly as I could. The more I thought about it, the more I was positive that Tweek’s dad was fucking with him. Tweek had told me that his dad had given him ‘intruder drills’ before, usually in the middle of the night, for no reason. If Tweek wasn’t constantly terrified of someone breaking in and raping him and killing him, then he probably would’ve been calmer in the event of a break-in. But Tweek’s dad was an asshole, and apparently got off on tormenting his son. “Tweek, listen. I need you to stay on the phone with me, then --”

“ _GAH! N-no, I need to call the police, I need to_ \--”

“Your dad will take care of that,” I said softly, like I was talking to a wounded animal. “But . . . maybe this is a bad time to weigh in, but I have a feeling he’s lying, and I know somewhere deep down, you do, too.”

“ _NGH! But I_ hear _them! Whoever it is, I can hear them talking! GAH! Th-they keep telling me to go outside!_ ”

“Well, first of all, _don’t_ do that. Second of all, stay on the phone with me, anyway, because if your dad’s actually being serious, then I promise you, he already called the police.”

Tweek’s breathing was still erratic, but I could tell he was trying to calm himself down. “ _Okay . . . I-I . . . I’m in my closet now. I locked my door, the light’s off._ ” There was a pause before he added, his voice a whisper, “ _Can you keep talking to me?_ ”

I knew why he asked me that; he had told me before that my voice calmed him down, because it was almost always calm and bored, and it was deep, which he liked. So I said, “There’s a full moon tonight. It’s really big and really bright here. And there’s no clouds, so I can see my favorite constellation. Do you remember what my favorite constellation is?” I didn’t wait for him to answer. “The Little Dipper. Because you can only see it in the winter time, and the winter is my favorite time of year. I like when it’s cold outside. I guess it’s because I grew up in South Park, and it was always cold there. There was only, like, two weeks of summer, and the rest of the time it was fucking freezing outside. But the weather is warmer up here. Winter is way shorter, and summer is way longer. You like winter, too, because if it’s too cold outside, then it gives you a reason to stay inside all the time. But it wasn’t your favorite, because it meant your coffee shop was busier. Your favorite is fall, because you’re scared of bees, and in the spring you always get stung at least four times every year. You don’t like summer because it’s too hot. You like the color of the leaves, and you liked Thanksgiving because your Uncle Bryan came to your house, and he always distracted you from your parents. Ever since he passed away, it hasn’t been your favorite anymore. It makes you sad, but you weren’t sad this year. At least, you didn’t seem that way to me.

“You know, this might sound weird, but I like watching you sleep. And before you freak out, it’s not because I’m a creep or anything. You’re cute when you sleep. You look so peaceful and happy, and, as much as I love you for who you are, twitches and everything, I know you don’t like twitching and shaking all the time. I wish you were always that peaceful, because when you’re happy, I’m happy. Sooo happy.”

Before I could continue on talking about whatever came to mind, Tweek shushed me, and said, his voice so quiet I almost didn’t hear him, “ _Oh God, Craig, there’s someone in my room_.”

Something about those words made me think that maybe Tweek’s dad was actually serious that time. And if he was, then that mean that Tweek must’ve been fucking _terrified_. “It’s okay, Tweek, just try to stay calm, control your breathing, everything is going to be okay --”

All I heard in response was Tweek’s raspy, short breaths, followed by a sudden scream. And then the phone call ended.

I jumped straight out of my bed. My eyes were blown out, and my heart was beating rapidly in my chest. I stared at the blank screen of my phone, trying to figure out if that phone conversation had just happened, but I wasn’t in the mood to question things, no fucking way. So, without even thinking, I flung open my bedroom door and ran down the hallway, down the stairs to the living, through the living room to the hallway, where I tore down the stairs to the basement so fast I almost tripped and fell to the bottom.

I had every intention of calling Tweek back, and, if he answered, I wasn’t going to fuck around with ‘nighttime voices’ to avoid waking up my family. I was too scared for that, so I removed the problem by removing myself.

I paced the length of the grubby basement wildly, scrolled through my phone until I found Tweek’s number in the recent calls section, but, before I had the chance to hit call back, my phone started vibrating in my hand, the screen informing me that I had an incoming call from Tweek.

I answered without hesitation, but, without giving me a chance to say hello, Tweek screamed hysterically, “ _Oh, God, it was my dad_!”

My heart sank into my chest, while somehow also rising angrily to my throat. God, his dad was such a _fucking_ asshole. First, he tries to scare Tweek into coming home by telling him about a probably-made-up rapist that went after guys who looked exactly like Tweek, and then he scares Tweek after having tried to scare him back home? What was he even trying to do? Did he want his son around or not? Did he even care about him? Because the more I heard about him, the more I started to think that that probably wasn’t the case.

“ _He played a recording outside of someone talking and told me it was a kidnapper! He said there were rapists in town and to keep an eye out, but I didn't think they'd come to steal me! **I didn't think they'd come to steal me!** GAH! NGH! Oh, Jesus, I thought they were gonna get me, **they were gonna get me**_ _ **!** Oh God, my heart, Jesus, I can’t breath --! _ ”

My heart was cracking, because, even though I’d never been around one before, I was pretty sure my Tweek was having a panic attack, and there wasn’t anything I could do when I was two states away, especially when he was in the same house as the two people who had just given him the panic attack to begin with. So I just . . . said what I thought would help, even if I knew for sure it probably wasn’t going to do anything. “Tweek, listen to me, please, you have to breath. In through your nose, out through your mouth, you need to calm yourself or you’ll pass out --”

“ _Tweek, son, who are you talking to?”_ a distant voice said, the voice airy and so calm it was like the man was floating on clouds.

“ _Oh, Jesus, n_ _ _o_ one, Dad_ ,” Tweek wheezed. “ _Just an -- NGH! EHH! -- an imaginary friend_.”

“ _That’s good to hear,_ ” the voice said again. “ _It’s healthy to have such a vivid imagination, especially at your age. I’ll set an extra plate at breakfast tomorrow morning. Your mother’s making your favorite, our best-selling Sunset Blend._ ”

My jaw almost dropped at his words. What the fuck did ‘especially at your age’ mean? Tweek was nineteen, having an imaginary friend at nineteen wasn’t healthy, it was _concerning_!

Tweek’s voice reached that shrill screech, which, while still being a horrible thing, meant he was getting control of his breathing. So. Progress? “ _GAH! But Dad, I don’t --_ ”

“ _It’s alright, Tweek, it’s no trouble at all,_ ” Tweek’s dad said, completely missing what Tweek was trying to say.

Another voice -- a more feminine voice -- said, “ _Goodnight, Tweek. Your father and I love you_.”

It took a few seconds, but Tweek returned to the phone. " _I . . . I'm sorry, Craig, I didn't_ \--"

"Don't apologize, Tweek, just  . .." I let out a breath and pinched the bridge of my nose. " _Please_ don't apologize."

“ _Did you . . . how much of that did you hear?_ ” he asked, his voice so unbelievably shaky.

I sighed. “From . . . I think from the beginning. Are you okay?”

Tweek whimpered, and his breath got even more uneven, and I’m pretty sure my heart actually broke when he said, “ _N-no_. . .” I knew he wasn’t finished talking yet -- I could practically feel the words on the tip of his tongue -- so I kept quiet and waited.

And, after maybe five seconds, he finally spoke again. “ _Why would he do that? Why would_ she _do that? They’re my parents, they’re supposed to love me . . . why don’t they love me?_ ”

Jesus, the complete and utter heartbreak in his voice actually made me want to cry. “Tweek, of course they love you. They’ve got to, that’s a parents job. To love their kids. And even if they don’t show it, they do, I swear. It’s impossible not to love you, Tweek. Take it from me, I know. I tried not to, but I couldn’t help it. Can’t help it. You’re amazing, you’re the _best_.” I let out a breath. “I love you so much, and I can’t _wait_ until you can get away from them.”

“ _This isn’t even the worst thing they’ve done,_ ” he whimpered, and I could picture him, sitting at the very corner of his bed against the wall, curled into a ball, with his free hand buried in his hair. Alone.

Jesus, the _last_ fucking thing he needed was to be alone, but the alternative was be with his parents, and he definitely didn’t fucking need _that_.

“What’s the worst thing they’ve done?” I asked, actually kind of nervous to hear the answer.

“ _I-I_. . .” Tweek’s voice trailed off. “ _I can’t tell you._ ”

Fuck, those fucking words again. But this time I wasn’t angry about it, it just made me more worried. “Tweek --”

“ _GAH! I-I mean, I’ll tell you at some point, I swear, just_. . .” he let out a rough, frustrated breath. “ _Not right now. I . . . I can’t do it right now._ ”

I smiled sadly at a nicely-preserved spider web in the corner. “Okay, Tweek. Just know that I’m always here if you need me. Even at two in the morning, when you just need someone to talk to. I'm always here. Okay?”

Tweek sniffled and whimpered. “ _Okay_ _. Thank . . . thank you, Craig._ ”

"You're the best boyfriend in the world, Tweek," I said, forcing some happiness into my voice for his sake. "I'm not going to waste any time I could get with you by being my normal asshole self."

Tweek let out a hesitant laugh, but he found it in himself to at least try, and that was all that mattered. That he was going to try, and I was there to help him if he needed me. 

There was a beat of silence before I asked, “So what do you want to talk about now?”

“ _It’s late, don’t . . . don’t you want to go to sleep?_ ” he asked shakily, but I could tell by his voice that he didn’t want to hang up, which was something I understood, considering what he had just gone through. And there was no _way_ he was going to sleep that night. And, really, the chances of me leaving Tweek totally alone in a house whose only other inhabitants were his mom and dad were slim to fucking none, so sleep for me was impossible.

So I said, “No, I’m okay. I like talking to you.”

Tweek smiled -- I couldn’t see it, but I could feel it -- and he said, “ _I like talking to you, too._ ”

I didn’t -- strictly speaking -- get to sleep that _night_. Tweek and I didn’t stop talking until he informed me at 4:00 that his parents were getting ready to open the coffee shop, and that he had an eight hour shift that started in thirty minutes. He didn’t even mention this ‘breakfast’ that his mom was apparently making for him, which just told me that his parents either forgot, or didn’t mean it anyway. It made me feel so fucking bad for him, that his parents made him work like that, but I didn’t let it show. I knew the last thing Tweek wanted was pity.

So when he told me that, I just said, “Okay, Tweek. Call me or text me when your shift is over. ”

“ _I will. ‘Bye, Craig._ ”

“‘Bye, Tweek.”

And then we hung up.

I managed to grab four or five hours of sleep after I ended my phone call with Tweek, and ignored my mom’s looks that she gave me over breakfast.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short and sweet and I hope you liked it! Let me know how you liked Craig's parents, I'm curious as to what your thoughts are. 
> 
> Also, little anecdote: at some point in this story, the phrase: 
> 
> "Don't look. Someone's giving him a blowjob behind the dumpster." 
> 
> will come up. I am not giving context. But I wrote that line at work at the library on a blank document, because I thought it was funny and would work well in one of the coming chapters. Well, some old lady snuck up behind me and stared at my screen, and she got a NICE old look at a sentence about blowjobs... Because THAT wasn't totally awkward or anything...


	23. Has Someone Slapped a Ring on Craig Tucker?

It was raining. But not like a sprinkling rain, but like a downpour powerful enough to knock trees over.

And I was out in it, running down the sidewalk towards my house. It was too windy for an umbrella, so I was shielding my head from the rain using my briefcase. My chullo would’ve gotten soaked if I didn’t.

I sprinted up the steps to my house, hoping I wasn’t going to slip on the slick bricks. Tweek texted me on my drive home, saying he was going to leave the door unlocked so I didn’t have to fumble with my keys. But it didn’t seem like I had to worry about that, because the door flung open for me, and slammed shut behind me without me even having to touch the knob.

I blinked at my sudden entrance into dry warmth, and felt a pair of warm arms wrap themselves around me. It was Tweek, and he was shaking.

“Oh, Jesus, I was so worried about you!” he shrieked, pushing his face into my chest and tightening his grip around my waist.

I smiled. “Relax, honey, I’m fine,” I said reassuringly, bringing a freezing wet hand up and running my fingers through his warm, coffee-scented hair. “But can you let go of me so I can get out of these clothes and check on my paperwork? I really hope water didn’t get inside --”

Tweek let go of me, leaning back and showing me a frown. “You should’ve gotten a nice briefcase, like I _told_ you to. One that’s _weatherproof._ ”

“Waste of good money, Tweek,” I said, ruffling his hair with a grin. I removed my sopping coat jacket and hanging it, for the time being, on the coat wrack by the door. I untied my tie as I added, “Jesus, that storm will _not_ let up.”

“I brought the windchimes inside,” Tweek said, grabbing my coat and folding it over his arm. “The wind would’ve destroyed them if I didn’t. I closed the garage door, too. And the two Stripes are in the kitchen with me, they got scared being alone in our room, and I had to get dinner ready.”

“Babe, you just wanted an excuse to bring Stripe 5 and 6 into the kitchen,” I said, amused.

“That is _not_ true,” Tweek said, but there was a smile on his face. “You know they get lonely. You do it, too!”

He was right. I did do it, too. But it was hard to ignore them when they whimpered and snorted. They were so fucking adorable, and Tweek and I were weak to their manipulative powers. I pulled my chilled hat from my head with the intent to squeeze the water out and toss it into the dryer once I was in sweatpants and a NASA t-shirt. I leaned forward and kissed Tweek on the cheek, before walking past him and saying,

“I’m gonna get changed, I’ll meet you, in like, five minutes!”

He gave out a vague affirmation, and we went our separate ways.

Once I was comfortable, and all my clothes were either in the dryer, or drying in the bathroom, (a series of actions that happened in an unrealistically short amount of time), I made my way downstairs and into the kitchen. Tweek was already sitting at the table, a plate of pancakes, a bowl of fruit, and a pourer thing of maple syrup sitting on a lazy susan at the center. He was drumming his fingers on the table with one hand and taking shallow, casual sips of coffee.

I sat across from him at the table, and stared at the dinner set before me. “Sweetheart, you make the _best_ pancakes.”

He did his little-laugh. “I know. And don’t forget, you come home early tomorrow.”

That was a very significant, very groan-worthy statement. Tweek and I had a system. We had alternating work schedules; on the days that Tweek came home early from his engineering job, he cooked. And the days I came home early from the office, I attempted to cook. If we were both held late, we ordered pizza, and if we were both early, we would cook together.

It worked out, even if my complete and utter lack of skill in the kitchen despised it.

“I don’t know _why_ you still let me cook,” I said with a snort. “You know we’re just going to end up eating either burnt spaghetti or undercooked spaghetti.”

“I like your spaghetti,” Tweek defended, placing his half-full mug of coffee on the table.

I rolled my eyes. “You just like carbs.”

“Carbs are good.”

“That they are,” I said, reaching forward and starting to pile pancakes onto my plate. Tweek was really good at breakfast food. It was his specialty. Not to say that he was bad at cooking other foods, but breakfast for dinner was probably the best meal Tweek ever cooked. Next to his stir fry. Jesus, his stir fry was the fucking best ever. “How was your day?”

He shrugged. “It was okay. Like any other day, I guess. Darrell from administration, you remember him?”

I nodded.

“Well, he’s still a total asshole. He called me ‘twink’ again today. I almost broke his nose on reflex.”

I huffed. “Babe, I have no idea why you put up with him. I can totally knock his teeth out, just say the word.”

“No, Craig, that’d just start all this . . . fighting and drama that would just make things _way_ too complicated --”

“Well, then tell Mariam, she’s cool, and will suspend his ass in a heartbeat.”

“That’s called narking,” Tweek said, rolling his eyes. “Even if I do it anonymously, everybody will still know it’s me. I’m not exactly subtle.”

“That you are not,” I said, brushing our ankles together gently. I smirked at the blush on his face, and at the fact that he didn’t move away.

Despite his crimson face, Tweek giggled and held a hand over his mouth. “Not at the table, Craig!”

We chatted some more about nothing and everything, and, when we were all finished, Tweek dropped a napkin on his plate and said happily, “I also made cupcakes!” He gestured behind him at the island, where a tray of cupcakes, all frosted with either navy blue frosting or that olive green that he likes so much, sat, a plastic cover keeping them fresh. “For dessert!”

I stood up from my chair and made my way to Tweek’s side of the table, and knelt beside him. He watched me with his big, curious hazel eyes, but I just gave him a smile, and brought my arms around his waist, holding him gently. He did his little giggle-laugh and brushed his fingers through my still-damp hair, and he met me halfway as I leaned forward, pressing my mouth against his firmly but softly. Just the way he liked it. He smiled into my lips, and I pulled back enough to whisper, “I’d rather have _you_ for dessert.”

He shivered in my arms and moaned softly, tilting his head and offering his lips for another kiss.

I obliged. And I obliged again, and then again, and then again . . .

 

I blinked my eyes slowly open, my body transcending from that fucking awesome dream slowly and almost delicately. Nothing really woke me up, but I guess my body decided to be a total bitch and wake me up just when my aforementioned fucking awesome dream was getting even more fucking awesome.

I reached onto my bedside table for my phone, and, when I clicked on the screen, I guess I realized why I was woken up. It was 1:00 in the afternoon. I had gotten like ten hours of sleep. I sat up sleepily, stretched my tired limbs and tossing my blanket off of my legs. Thank fuck I remembered to put socks on before bed, because the air was fucking freezing. Before I left my room, I grabbed a sweatshirt and tugged it over my head.

I yawned, scratched the back of my head underneath my hat, and padded my way down the stairs to the kitchen. That was the moment I realized that the house was empty: the kettle was on the back burner of the stove, not the front. My mom was a huge tea drinker. She didn’t drink it as much as Tweek drank coffee, but she generally got herself refills throughout the day, so the kettle was forever on the front burner. It wasn’t. Which meant she wasn’t home.

And I realized Dad wasn’t home because the kitchen table was empty. My dad was an avid craftsman. But not like cool crafts; he specialized in boats in bottles, whatever those were called. But he was also into model airplanes, and shit like that. And on his days off -- he never worked weekends -- that was pretty much how he would spend his time. He would alternate between crafts, and working in the garage, but, because it was the middle of winter, chances were he wouldn’t be out there.

But even though the table was empty of crafts, there _was_ something on it. A note, in my mom’s handwriting.

 

_Craig,_

_At a stupid fundraiser thing for Trish’s school. Be back at 3 or something._

_Mom_

 

The corners of my mouth tugging upwards at that. Mom wrote like she talked, and I liked how my mom talked. It was funny, even though I never laughed at it.

All I took from the note was that I had the house to myself for another two hours. Although, having the house to myself was about the same as having a full house of Tuckers, because we very rarely actually talked to each other.

I scavenged through my kitchen for something to eat. I was a terrible cook, so I decided on just making myself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Nice and easy and boring, just the way I liked my sandwiches.

Sidenote, and one I’d been mulling over from time to time: if Tweek and I ever _moved in_ moved in together, like an actual apartment with an actual kitchen, I didn’t know _how_ we would eat. Tweek never mentioned being a good cook, really, he just said he made really good cupcakes. So that either meant that Tweek was a secret good cook in a general and just specialized in dessert, or Tweek and I would eat sandwiches, instant ramen, canned soup, cereal, and cupcakes as our every day diet. Which wasn’t necessarily a _bad_ thing as far as I was concerned, but it was _very_ unhealthy.

But I guess my dream decided for me that Tweek was good at cooking. I smiled at the vivid memory. Jesus, how fucking awesome that would be, I remember thinking fondly.

I decided to toast my bread first, which was about the extent of my culinary expertise, and, while I was waiting for that to finish, I poured a glass of orange juice and got out the peanut butter -- smooth, duh -- and jelly -- strawberry, obviously -- and, by the time that was done, the high-pitched ding of the toaster interrupted the silence.

And I had just finished spreading the peanut butter on my sandwich -- jelly always come first because it’s grosser when there’s a little bit of peanut butter in jelly than if there is a little bit of jelly in peanut butter -- when my phone pinged. Licking the knife clean, I glanced down to see who it was, and smiled when I saw it was from Tweek. The text said:

_Just got out of work! My parents actually let me out early, facetime?_

I nodded, even though I was alone, and, letting my finger hover over the sensor, I went to Tweek’s name in my contacts. I hit the Facetime button, and waited approximately one second for him to answer.

“ _Hey, Craig!_ ” Tweek greeted with a smile. He was in a dark room that was illuminated by a single light, somewhere off screen. It gave him this kind of . . . angelic look. His skin looked softer, his eyes brighter, and his smile happier. He was _so fucking cute_. My dream came rushing back to me in that moment. Seeing Tweek so happy to see me, like we were an old married couple while also being a young starry eyed couple. It was a good feeling. Seeing him made me feel good.

I smiled back. “Hey, Tweek. How was your shift?”

Tweek let out a breath, the smile slipping into a thoughtful frown. “ _Really shitty._ ”

My mind went -- illogically -- to Darrell from administration. “Uh oh, what happened? Who’s teeth do I need to kick in?”

The frown lifted and Tweek did his little giggle-laugh. “ _Craig_!” he chastised. “ _Nobody! It was just long, that’s all. But some old lady did give me a $10 tip, so that was cool._ ”

“Well, good. I’m glad it turned around at some point. What do you have planned for the rest of the day?”

Tweek let out a happy sigh, and the camera moved rapidly, as if it was falling backwards. When the image settled, I realized that Tweek was just laying down on a bed, the pillows donning olive green pillow cases, and he pulled a blanket up to his neck. “ _Nothing_!”

I laughed. “Nothing is good.”

“ _Where are you?_ ”

I raised an eyebrow. “. . . In Nebraska?”

Tweek snorted. “ _No, dumbass, I mean, where in your house? Are you parents around?_ ”

“I’m in the kitchen, and my parents are with Tricia, they have some dumb fucking fundraiser thing to do for Tricia’s school,” I said.

“ _Who’s Tricia?_ ” Tweek asked his eyebrows quirking.

“Tricia’s my sister.”

“ _You have a sister?_ ” Tweek said incredulously. “ _How come you never told me?_ ”

I took a bite out of my sandwich thoughtfully. I didn’t even remember if I’d told him or not, but whatever, I guess not. “Because I hate her. She’s a little bitch.”

“ _How old is she?_ ”

“Trish’s thirteen.”

“ _Oh. You know, I always wanted a sibling,_ ” Tweek mused, a half smile on his face.

“Brother, sister?” I asked when he didn’t elaborate. “Older, younger? I need details, Tweek.” He was weirdly untalkative. I mean, he didn’t seem unhappy; he seemed really, really happy actually, but I guess he was just in a thoughtful, musing -- and giggly, apparently -- mood.

Tweek did his little giggle-laugh to illustrate my mental point. “ _I don’t know, I just didn’t want to be alone. I wanted a sibling like I wanted a friend, so I guess it didn’t matter. As long as they were nice to me._ ”

“Siblings are never nice, Tweek,” I said. “They’re all mean, all of them.” I paused, before adding, “Well, I guess that’s not true. Clyde has an older sister, and she was always pretty . . . okay. She left us alone, and, when she babysat, she let us do whatever we wanted. As long as we didn’t tell Clyde’s dad that she smoked.”

“ _Did you?_ ”

I snorted. “Of course not, Tweek. I’m a man of my word.”

“ _Because you don’t care enough to lie,_ ” Tweek said proudly. He had a wide grin on his face, like a child.

I took another bite of my sandwich and said through the corner of my mouth, “You’ve been smiling a lot lately. And, before you freak out, that’s a good thing.”

Tweek did his little giggle-laugh. “ _It’s my Craig smile. Just for you._ ”

My heart fucking melted. Just . . . a puddle on the floor, and I hid my blushing cheeks behind my sandwich. I grappled with a response, but all I came up with was, “Fuck you.”

He rolled his eyes. “ _You’ve still got, what, uh? Five months and twenty-eight days or something left of the honeymoon phase. Savor the cheese before it’s gone._ ”

Disregarding Tweek’s garbled metaphor, that actually sounded kind of . . . nice. Not like I’d ever say that out loud, though. I laughed at the thought, and opened my mouth to respond, when a sudden voice spoke behind me.

“Uh . . . Craig?”

My laughter fizzled to a stop and I actually dropped my phone onto the table with a loud CLANG sound, which just made me feel even more jittery than my dad’s sudden appearance in the kitchen.

“ _What happened? Are you okay?_ ” Tweek asked, his voice confused and worried, but I was too focused on the weirded out and suspicious expression on my dad’s face.

As subtly and casually as I could, I hung up on Tweek without a word, my eyes never breaking hold of the stare down between my dad and I.

_Fuck fuck fuck shit shit if Dad heard Tweek talking about the honeymoon phase then that’s it everything’s over I’m out there’s nothing I can do about it fuck shit FUCK --_

“You’re back early,” I managed out in a blank voice, after a long, awkward pause.

“What were you laughing about?” my dad responded, not even acknowledging my comment. But the thing is: he didn’t even sound like . . . overly skeptical. He didn’t show any signs that he’d me and Tweek’s conversation. He didn’t sound like he was accusing me of whatever, or give me any clues that he’d randomly jumped to the conclusion that I was gay and facetiming with my equally gay boyfriend while he was out of the house, like we were a couple of teenagers again. He just sounded normal, like he actually didn’t really care, as long as I gave him an explanation. Even if that explanation was total bullshit.

“Um . . . YouTube video,” I explained awkwardly, averting my eyes to my lunch, and picking up my sandwich absently, to try to give the illusion that I was doing something. “New comedian. Really funny. That’s why I was laughing.”

Dad eyed me for a seconds longer, before he shrugged and turned away. “Oh. Okay.”

I stayed put for a few seconds as my dad rummaged through the refrigerator absently. The silence was deafening; usually, I didn’t mind not talking to my dad, but the fact that I was almost caught in a position that wasn’t altogether compromising, or damning really, but very difficult to explain given the circumstances . . . it made the silence seem much worse. Double fisting my sandwich and my phone, I stood up and hurried from the room.

Once I was alone in my bedroom, I leaned my back against the door and let out a breath. It was . . . abrupt, and the shock of getting caught just casually talking to my boyfriend by my dad was actually making my heart race. It sounds dumb, I know, but the thought of my dad catching me before I came out to him was one of the most terrifying things I could think of. I would’ve rather gotten kidnapped, and that’s the brutal fucking truth. It sounds dramatic, I know, but as I stood in my bedroom, my heart pounding against my chest, I was faced with the realization that . . . _shit_ , I actually cared what my dad thought. It was a jarring epiphany, because my entire life I was under the impression that I could not possibly care less about what my dad thought of me.

But if my dad put two and two together, of my weird behavior in talking about Tweek, chances were . . . bad. Just bad in general, everything was bad. I was actually scared and I very rarely get scared. But that was a moment of immense weakness and I don’t like remembering how lonely that felt, to be standing in my bedroom, my phone clutched to my chest, and a half-eaten peanut butter and jelly sandwich gripped tight in my unoccupied hand. Maybe it was obvious, maybe it wasn’t, but Tweek was the unconditional cure to my loneliness, and that adorable asshole was in an entirely different state. Sometimes Red Racer, Clyde and Token and Jimmy, and my guinea pigs dulled the horrible fucking feeling of feeling entirely alone, but not a single one of them were capable of providing me with the peace that Tweek gave me just by being in the same room as me.

And he was miles, _hours_ , away.

My phone started ringing, which just gave me a second heart attack along with the extended heart attack I was already suffering. I lifted my phone to see who it was, and, of course, it was Tweek.

I accepted the facetime, and the second I saw Tweek’s face, I felt my chest crumple slightly, and I had to look away. And, because I didn’t want Tweek to see me, I tilted the phone so that the camera was facing the ceiling. I didn’t want to speak, so I let him take over.

“ _Craig, are you okay? What happened?_ ”

“I, uh . . .” I swallowed, letting my head thunk against my wooden door. “My dad came home early.”

Tweek made a noise like he understood, but didn’t say anything, so I continued.

“He saw me laughing, and you know me, Tweek, I never laugh. I don’t think I’ve laughed around my parents in . . . years. We just . . . we don’t really _do_ that. And I didn’t want him catching me talking to my boyfriend. I . . . I panicked, Tweek.”

“ _It’s okay, Craig,_ ” Tweek said softly, and, with his words, I felt the nagging desire to see his face, so I brought the screen down. He was smiling, still in his bed, but he was propped up against the headboard, his blanket pulled up to his chest. “ _Everybody panics when it comes to shit like this. It’s . . . it can be scary. Fuck, the other night, when I called you at like two in the morning, I told my parents that you were my_ imaginary friend _, and those fuckhats believed me. You just barely figured it out yourself, what, you said a month ago? Nobody expects you to be open about it. Jesus, I’ve known I was gay since I was twelve, and my parents don’t have a clue. These things take time. Don’t be so hard on yourself._ ”

Despite the pressure in my chest, I felt a small smile pick at the corner of my mouth. Just talking to Tweek was making that weight on my rib cage lessen, so I decided to at least attempt to push my concerns aside altogether, and said, “ _Fuckhat_? Really, Tweek?”

I guess Tweek accepted the chance of subject, because he did his little giggle-laugh. “ _Am I wrong?_ ”

“No, babe, you’re spot on.”

My statement hung out in the open for a second before I realized what I’d just said.

And I mean . . .

Holy _shit_.

My face blossomed scarlet very quickly, and I moved my phone’s camera again so Tweek couldn’t see me, but I could still him, albeit at an angle.

I, uh. I didn’t mean to call him that. It was the remnants of that fucking dream I’d had the night before. The super awesome dream where Tweek and I lived together and came home from work to each other and did shit together and it was just so fucking awesome, it was like a dream. Well, it _was_ a dream, but God, it was a great dream.

“Pretend you didn’t just hear that --”

“ _You just called me ‘babe’._ ”

Tweek and I spoke at the same time, and then both fell silent at the same time. We were quiet for almost half a minute, before Tweek cleared his throat and said through an embarrassed laugh, “ _Are you blushing?_ ”

I grumbled, “Yes, because I’m fucking embarrassed, dickhead. Let’s drop it, okay?”

But Tweek, apparently, wasn’t in the mood to drop it. “ _You should . . . do that more often._ ”

I hesitated. “Do what more often?”

“ _Call me . . . that. I liked being called that._ ” Tweek’s smile got a little dreamy and lost. “ _It feels nice._ ”

So the wording was a little weird, but he got the sentiment across. I paused for just a second, before shifting the camera so that he could see me again. “Okay. _Babe_.”

Tweek did his little giggle-laugh, and the whole entire situation with my dad was forgotten.

* * *

A thing to know about Middle Town: it really is a boring place. Compared to South Park, that is. I had only ever lived in South Park, before Middle Town, so, from my experience, it was a normal place. But there was this thing that happened every year called the Kool Aid Festival. It lasted for about a week, and it was when everybody only drank Kool Aid. It was forbidden to drink water, milk, coffee, tea, anything. It was the only thing served in restaurants, and water fountains were closed off. And it was like a normal festival, too; there was a ferris wheel, a merry-go-round, a petting zoo, the whole thing. And every night, at the Town Green, there would be, like, these cult-like keg parties where people tried to drink as much Kool Aid as they could without puking. It was fucking weird, but definitely not as weird the shit that happened in South Park.

Kool Aid wasn’t even invented in Middle Town. It was invented in Hastings. But, for some reason, the people there liked to pretend they were important enough to be the birth town of this sugar-based drink that’s actually really gross if you think about it.

Besides the Kool Aid Festival, there was also this chick named The Hag of Haggerty Lane. Haggerty Lane was a street a few blocks from my house, and it was super shady. Literally -- there were like two functioning street lights -- and figuratively -- that’s pretty much where all the drug addicts lived. The Hag was just some middle-aged woman that . . . lived in an alley? I don't actually know where she lived, I just know that she alley-hopped along Haggerty Lane, but you could never find her anywhere else. Nobody knew the Hag’s real name, either. Nobody knew anything about her at all. But she would give you a free hand job if you said, “Exit Stage Wilhelm.” Nobody figured out what the fuck it meant, but they all knew that that was all it took.

I never went to see the Hag myself, but her existence was common knowledge. I think even Tricia knew about her. She was like the local Bigfoot, except everybody knew for a fact that she was real. She never accepted money, so she wasn’t technically a prostitute, so she was never arrested or anything.

But that was pretty much it. Satan never went there, there were no superheroes, no wars, no major conflicts that lead to mass murder, no record of cannibalism, and the only famous person who visited was Mel Gibson. He was on a bender, and he was actually just driving by in a limo, he didn’t even stop. But the town acted like he stayed in a hotel, and ate all their local, corporate-owned food. There’s actually a monument to where he took a drunken piss out his limo window.

I guess maybe the South Park in me was unable to deter the South Park in Mel Gibson.

But, anyway, Middle Town. Boring place. So the most exciting outing that happened to me that holiday vacation was when I went grocery shopping, about a week into the school break.

I was really the only person in my family that regularly consumed peanut butter, so, when it inevitably ran out because of my constant consumption of the shit, I had to go to the store myself to get it. I was at the checkout, with only peanut butter, bread, and Tweek’s favorite brand of chocolate, (that asshole got me hooked on it), when I heard someone say,

“Holy shit, it’s the Tuckman himself!”

I recognized that voice immediately, because I’d heard it for the past four years of my life. It was Travis Smith, my vodka and weed guy.

I looked in front of me and saw him, bagging up some of his groceries at the self-bag thing, (Bud and cigarette papers; how inconspicuous), and he looked the same as the last time I’d seen him, except somehow even worse. Bloodshot eyes, pale, scabbed skin, and crooked teeth. He was wearing a thick, ratty coat and a baseball cap, to hide the fact that he was balding. I tried to get that asshole help, and he didn’t listen to me, so I didn’t really feel much sympathy stirring in my gut.

“Oh. Hi, Travis.”

“I heard you’re back in town,” Travis said excitedly.

I grimaced. Even though he was an alcoholic drug dealer, he was still so much like Clyde.

I met Travis when I was a freshman, and it was completely by accident. Travis was two years older than me, so we did go to high school together. I was in the bathroom, washing my hands when I heard glass smash from inside one of the stalls. I glanced behind me and saw this amber liquid pooling on the dirty tiled floor. I knew exactly what it was; I could smell it the second I walked in, although it was dulled some by the normal gross scent of a public school bathroom, and the thick stench of skunk.

“Fuck, man,” Travis said, and I saw some ratty looking guy stoop to his knees and start collecting the shards of glass with his bare hands.

I shrugged, because I didn’t care, and turned back to the sink, trying to pump soap into my hand. The soap dispenser was empty. Typical.

A few seconds later, in which I tried to wash my hands with just water, Travis came out of the stall. I observed him in the mirror, and saw the broken bottle nursed in his hands, which were both full of shallow cuts. He didn’t seem to care though. He didn’t look totally drunk, (he wasn’t even swaying all that much), but he had bloodshot eyes and a pink face.

I eyed him as he threw the glass away in a practically overflowing trash can, and he made his way to the sink, turning it on and just letting the water run over his hands. The water turned a light shade of red as he brushed away the dried and fresh blood, but he didn’t look particularly bothered. He actually had a casual smirk on his face, the kind of expression that pretty much explained his entire personality. I had to admit, he was kind of a mesmerizing sight. Like a car wreck.

I guess he felt my eyes on him, because he looked up and immediately turned his head towards me. We stared at each other for a few seconds before he cleared his throat and said,

“You look like shit.”

It was true. I was still adjusting to Middle Town, and it sucked. For some reason, at that point in time, I actually _missed_ South Park. Maybe not the shit that happened there, but it was weird being away from everybody, and it still kind of felt like an extended vacation, like we were going to go back to our first house any day, any hour, any minute. It was a terrible feeling, and I felt like shit constantly.

“You too,” I said blankly.

He didn’t acknowledge the insult. “What’s your name, fresh meat?” That was what the shitty kids at Middle Town High called the ninth graders, when every other rational person called them freshmen.

Against my better judgement, and because I didn’t give two shits, I shrugged and said, “Craig.”

“You’re the new kid, right? I heard about you.”

I raised an eyebrow. It was only, like a week into the school year; I knew that New Kids always garnered more attention because all the students are curious about who they are and who they’ll make friends with. But I didn’t think news traveled _that_ fast. “What?”

“Yeah, all my girl friends won’t shut up about how hot you are.” His eyes surveyed me from head to toe, but I refused to squirm under his scrutiny. After a few seconds, he caught my eye again and said, “You’re okay.”

I rolled my eyes, and wiped my hands on my jeans. The dispenser was out of paper towels, of course, and there was no air blower thing, so my jeans were my only option. I didn’t answer him, because I didn’t know what to say.

“You seem cool, though,” he continued. “Wanna skip and get drunk?”

And, because I didn’t want to go back to freshman English, I agreed. We made a routine of it, and it lasted through all of high school.

It was very obvious Travis really liked me. Not, like romantically, but as a friend. And I’m not saying that in a douchey, cocky way, but Travis always got super excited every time he saw me. I didn’t really understand my appeal, because I was never particularly nice to him, but whatever. I tolerated him in high school because he scored me booze.

“Yeah. Holiday break,” I said.

“Cool, cool,” he said with a grin. “Wanna hang out?”

Did I want to hang out. Not really.

“I kind of . . . have things to do.”

“Bullshit, you, _ngh_ , you’re the most boring person on the face of the planet.”

Travis had a twitching thing. Not like Tweek, though, it wasn’t because of anxiety, and it wasn’t loud or anything. It was more of a groan, and it was because he had a crippling heroin addiction. I guess he was in a lull when I bumped into him then, but I’d seen him high many times. He pumped so much fucking . . . _shit_ in his body, even if he got clean he’d never fully recover. He’ll _always_ have that damn twitch. He would shake his head a few times after every twitch, too. He didn’t have it when I first met him. He developed it a couple years later. It got worse when he was using, obviously. After he started, he would go through this cycle of getting clean and then relapsing a few months later. It was a never-ending cycle. I did tell him _many_ times that he was going to fuck his life up completely if he kept using, but he never listened to me, so eventually I gave up and let him ruin his life. I mean, it wasn’t like either of us could afford rehab. That probably makes me a bad person, but I tried for about a year and a half -- he started using about two years into our . . . friendship? Agreement? -- but he never stopped. So. Whatever.

“Okay, fine. I won’t sugar coat it,” I answered. “I don’t want to hang out with you.”

For some reason, the grin on Travis’ face didn’t fall. If anything, it got bigger. “Oh, come on! For old times sake? It’s been awhile!”

I handed the cashier a twenty, and waited for my change. “It’s been six months.”

“Dude, that’s half a year. That’s two thirds of a pregnancy. That’s how far into senior year I got. That’s how old I was when my dad beat my mom and left her.”

I grimaced. Again. He had that effect on me. And he overshared. “Shut up, Travis --”

“I can go all day --”

“Alright, Jesus, _fine_. We can hang out. Where?”

“Oh, awesome!” he was with a laugh. “Back to my apartment!”

“Apartment? You don’t live in a cardboard box anymore?”

Travis rolled his eyes. “Very funny, Craig. It’s only about a ten minute walk from here.”

And that was how I found myself at Travis Smith’s apartment. Coincidentally, he lived on Haggerty Lane.

His apartment was on the bottom floor of the building, and it was super messy. Empty soda bottles and fast food wrappers strewn all over the place, a musty couch that was probably forty years old and had an ugly floral pattern, a ten inch TV just sitting on the floor, and there was even a syringe just lying in the corner, half hidden beneath a table propped against the wall that had a broken leg. I had spent four years of my life spending most of my weekends in that shithole. It was a stereotypical addict and drug dealer’s apartment.

It really made the difference between Nikiel and Travis that much more obvious.

Travis walked right into his apartment, dropping his key onto the coffee table that was little more than a piece of fixed-up plywood on legs, and then started rummaging in a cabinet that was on the floor, not attached to the wall like most cabinets should be. Keeping his eyes fixed on the bottles, he called knowingly over his shoulder, “Balkan?”

“Oh, uh . . .” I started awkwardly, scratching the back of my neck. “I don’t drink anymore. Well, not vodka.” I wasn’t entirely sure if it was smart of me to drink, like, beer and whiskey and wine and all that. I knew I’d never touch vodka again, but . . . maybe other shit was good?  

Travis looked up at me, a look of total confusion on his face. Which made sense; I never, and I mean _never_ , turned down vodka. “What do you mean?”

I folded my arms over my chest. “I mean I overdid it, and I can’t drink vodka anymore.”

“Like . . . _medically_ , or --”

“No, I mean, if I start drinking now, I don’t know if I’ll be able to stop. I had a really bad experience with it, so I don’t intend to touch that shit ever again.”

Travis clicked his tongue, and turned his attention back to the bottles. He pulled a bottle of Jack out for himself. He always liked whiskey more than vodka. “Either college turned you into a, _ngh_ , a total pussy, or you found a missus.” His intonation on that last part sounded like he thought the idea of me having a ‘missus’ was ridiculous. And, I mean, from what Travis knew of me, it kind of was.

I didn’t know, really, if Tweek changed me. I’ve mentioned before that he must’ve, because my view of the world changed the more I got to know him. I knew for a fact that he didn’t do it on purpose, but I almost wanted to be . . . better for him, maybe. I wanted to a better person, I didn’t want to be the unfeeling, uncaring, detached asshole that I was when I met him. Even before I met Tweek, I hated the kind of person I was in high school, but, after meeting Tweek, I despised him. He was too much like his dad.

I guess I was quiet for too long, lost in thought, because Travis looked up again, and his eyes widened. “Oh, you sly dog,” he said, a grin stretching across his face. “Has someone slapped a ring on _the_ Craig Tucker?”

I rolled my eyes, ignoring the heat in my cheeks. “I wouldn’t put it like that.”

“What’s her name?”

“It’s not a her.”

The words came out smoother and easier than I expected them to. I almost didn’t even have to try. Fuck, it was harder to come out to Clyde and Token, but that might’ve been because I cared more about them than I cared about Travis. Their reaction to my gayness mattered more than Travis’. If Travis rejected me than . . . oh, well, whatever. But if Clyde and Token rejected me . . . it was kind of a big deal.

“So you _are_ gay!”

It took a second for those words to make sense, but when they did, I glared at him. “What do you mean?”

Travis shrugged. “I don’t know, man, I always got these weird vibes from you. When we got drunk together, you never talked about girls. That doesn’t mean shit, I know, but it was just . . . weird, I don’t know. Every other guy I’ve ever gotten shitfaced with has talked about, _ngh_ , about girls at least once. But you just talked about your guinea pig and space and shit.”

Well, that wasn’t really something I could control -- how I talked when I got blackout drunk -- so I wasn’t particularly angry about it. I wasn’t as mad about rambling about my hobbies than I was mad about crying, like I’d done with Nikiel. And I knew I had never really been exactly girl crazy. It just wasn’t something I thought about very often. I finally figured out why.

“Oh.”

“So what’s _his_ name?”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “Why do you care?”

He chuckled, his tense shoulders moving jerkily. “We’re friends, right? Shouldn’t friends care?”

I mean, not really. I only just _barely_ tolerated Clyde when he talked about Bebe, and him and I had been friends for years. And I’m usually all about talking about Tweek, but that was only with people I knew. And only with people that I was out to. And I knew Travis, but part of me kind of hated him. He was around me at the second worst time of my life, (the worst being the constantly drunk, loss of Tweek deal), and he didn’t help me at all. I mean, he _helped_ me, but only as a dealer, and only by giving me more alcohol and more weed. Definitely not a friend. I guess you could argue that Nikiel did the same thing, but there was a huge difference: Travis thought it was funny. Nikiel didn’t.

I just shrugged. “I guess.”

“So? What’s this miracle-worker’s name?”

“Miracle worker?”

“It’s not every day someone can domesticate Craig Tucker.”

“I’m not _domesticated_.”

“You’re turning down vodka, dude. _Balkan_.”

I hummed. There wasn’t really much I could say to that. “I’m not going to talk about him with you. But his name is Tweek.”

There was a beat of silence. “Like the drug?”

“No, not like the drug,” I said harshly. Tweek’s sensitivity to meth had created a sort of proxy sensitivity in me. I still didn’t know why he had such a thing with meth, but I wasn’t going to ask. I figured he’d tell me eventually, like he’d promised to tell me what that horrible thing his parents had done to him was.

“Well, with a name like _Tweek_ \--”

“It’s not his fault his parents are shitheads,” I bit. “If you _ever_ meet him, don’t fucking talk about drugs, okay?”

“Is he an addict?”

“No, he’s not an addict.”

“ _Was_ he an addict?”

I chewed on my bottom lip thoughtfully, anxiously. I didn’t know the answer to that question, and there was something unsettling about not knowing the answer to that question. It would . . . explain some things, but it was a big leap from the information he’d given me, and I didn’t want to solidify any theories in my mind. That’s a pretty fucking heavy topic, and not one I wanted to take lightly, or talk about with fucking Travis Smith, Middle Town’s most successful drug dealer.

So I glared at him. “Let’s fucking stop talking about this.”

“Jesus, touchy --”

“Holy fuck, have you always been this much of an asshole?”

“I mean, how do you _not_ know if your boyfriend used to be a meth head? I don’t know, it just seems like something you should know about --”

Yes, thank you Travis.

I hadn’t even put my plastic bag of groceries down, and I had already decided to ditch him. “Okay, I’m leaving now. You’re the most obnoxious person I’ve ever met, and I hope you burn in hell.”

Travis just laughed. “Love you, too.”

See? This is what I mean. I just told him to burn in hell, and I totally wasn’t joking. My voice didn’t insinuate that I was joking. I was dead serious. And he responds with that? What the hell is wrong with people?

Seriously, I will never be able to understand.

* * *

When I got home, I resolved I was going to tell Tweek about Travis. He already had an idea of who Travis was, because I was sure I mentioned it at some point, but I never really realized how horrible of a person Travis was, and I regretted ever letting him in my life. Maybe high school would’ve been better if I didn’t spend it drunk and high and easily set-off. I guess it was just a mixture of bad decision making and horrible influences. It wasn’t entirely Travis’ fault, because I’m the one who let him enable me, but he should’ve realized that giving vodka and weed to a fifteen year old boy who was having a seriously hard time adjusting wasn’t exactly a stand-up thing to do.

It would’ve been easy to keep that from Tweek, because maybe I was making a bigger deal out of it than what it deserved. It was definitely something he’d get worried about, and for that reason alone, I decided he should know about it. Because imagine how he would’ve reacted if he found out later that I went to my old vodka guy’s apartment? Yeah. It sounds even worse when you word it like that.

I walked past my mom in the kitchen, and we didn’t say hi to each other. She didn’t even say anything when I put all my groceries away. Sidenote: I knew that my family wouldn’t eat it even if I didn’t put my name on it. Say what you will about the Tuckers, but unless they but it themselves or get explicit approval, they will not eat anything in the house. It was always a weird rule of the house that was unspoken and strictly followed.

I nibbled on some of the chocolate I’d bought and made my way to my bedroom.

In my mind I was trying to figure out how I was going to tell Tweek. I wanted to do it as soon as possible, and as painless as possible. No secrets. We couldn’t ever have secrets, because that was what ruined everything for us the first time.

I paced around my room for maybe five minutes, just shoving chocolate into my mouth, when I decided to just fucking get it over with. Before I could overthink it anymore than I already had, I plucked my phone from my pocket and clicked on the facetime button on Tweek’s contact info thing.

It took Tweek a few seconds to answer, and when he did, he was in his bedroom again, sunlight streaming in through his open window. His hair was wet and sticking to his head, and there were wet splotches on his olive-green shirt.

“ _Hi, Craig!_ ” he greeted with a grin. “ _Sorry about my hair, I just got out of the shower._ ”

“You look fine, babe,” I said, giving him a forced smile. (I wasn’t even embarrassed by the pet name that time around.) The more I thought about telling him, the more guilty I felt. It was almost an irrational guilt, because I hadn’t done anything wrong, but just the thought of Tweek’s worry killed me. But, like I said, it was better that he find out then, than if he did months from then by accident.

Tweek went quiet, his standard ‘Craig-smile’ slipping to a frown. I was about to ask what was wrong when he blurted out, “ _What happened? You have your ‘everything’s okay except it’s not’ face. Are you okay? Is it your dad? Are you missing the spring semester? Oh,_ Jesus, _I can’t have a new roommate --_ ”

“Calm down, Tweek,” I said, bringing my voice to that low, comforting tone that almost always worked. “Everything’s fine. Nothing bad happened. I’ll be there for the spring semester, nothing will be able to stop me.”

“ _Then what is it?_ ” Tweek asked.

“I just want to warn you,” I said slowly. “This might make you angry.”

Tweek harrumphed. “ _Tell me anyway._ ”

I chewed on my bottom lip. There really was no way to make it sound good; even though it wasn’t bad, it still wouldn’t come out right no matter how I worded it, so I decided to just rip off the band-aid and said, “I saw my old vodka guy.”

There was a beat of silence. Tweek’s eyebrows quirked, and I could pretty much see the cogs turning in his brain, like he was trying to figure out the significance of what I was telling him. “ _At like. The grocery store?_ ”

“Um, yeah.” Technically wasn’t a lie.

Tweek let out a breath, and a small relieved smile built on his face. “ _Oh. That’s not so bad._ ”

“And then I went back to his apartment.”

I kept my eyes down and waited out the long painful silence that I was met with. I felt almost unreasonably guilty. And it wasn’t like I was worried he’d be mad or anything, although I was kind of expecting him to be. It was more that . . . I didn’t want to disappoint him. It felt like such a simple situation, but to Tweek -- and by extension, me -- it was much more than simple.

When Tweek finally did speak, it was about what I was expecting. “ _I need details this_ instant _, Craig Tucker, because I swear to_ God _, if you drank -_ -”

“I didn’t, I promise,” I insisted. “It just . . . I don’t know, it felt like something you should know about. He did offer me some, but I said no, and I left and came right home and called you. Don’t be mad.”

There was another long pause, before Tweek let out a long breath and said, his voice calmer, “ _Craig, I’m not mad. Thank you for telling me, and needlessly giving me a heart attack, asshole. If you didn’t drink, that’s a good thing, right? I’m proud of you._ ”

I lifted my eyes and softened at the smile on Tweek’s face. “Thanks. Asshole.”

He let out a breathy laugh. “ _Your welcome. Dickhead._ ”

“So, putting aside my bullshit, how was your day, babe?” I asked, kicking my shoes off and relaxing back on my bed.

He shrugged, and I watched as he laid down on his bed, too, his blonde hair vibrant against his green pillows. “ _Okay, I guess. I worked my morning eight-hour shift, had a lot of shit customers_ ,” Darrell from administration, “ _And that old lady came in, the one who gave me a $10 tip?_ ” I nodded. “ _Only she just gave me a butterscotch candy and told me I was handsome. So, my dad’s been developing this new coffee blend, called his ‘Immaculate Blend’. He says it’s because it’s made from our freshest beans, but I don’t think he knows what immaculate means. It doesn’t taste very good, either. We sold one cup, and the woman puked on our floor. Oh, and my mom asked about you today._ ”

It took a few seconds, but I eventually processed what he just said. “Wait, your _mom_ asked about me? How does she know how I am?”

“ _Well_ ,” Tweek said with a sigh, “ _When I was talking to you on the phone the other day . . . when I called you really late after dad did . . ._ ” Tweek cleared his throat. “ _That_ thing _, remember?_ ”

My heart clenched at how he referred to it, but I ultimately decided not to comment, and instead nodded silently to show him I knew what he was talking about.

“ _Well my mom and I were talking, and I guess she was thinking about my, um, imaginary friend, because she asked how you were --_ ”

I grit my teeth but let him continue.

“ _And I totally forgot about making up some imaginary friend to explain this person I was talking to. So then I just said that I was_ actually _talking to a friend I made at college, and she asked me all sorts of questions, like what you’re majoring in, if you’re nice, what color hair you have --_ ”

What color hair I have? She sounded just as weird and spontaneous as Tweek.

“And what’d you say?”

“ _I answered her and everything, but it was just so weird_ ,” Tweek said. " _She’s never like . . . cared before, you know?_ ”

Yeah, I knew. I knew.

“What’d your, uh, _dad_ have to say about me?” I tried to keep my tone in check, but I actually despised the very thought of Tweek’s parents. His dad especially.

“ _Oh, uh . . ._ ” Tweek chewed on his bottom lip and averted his eyes. “ _Nothing, really. He just launched into this long-winded metaphor about coffee and then disappeared into the backroom for awhile. I think the complete and total failure of his ‘Immaculate Blend’ really hit him hard._ ”

I observed him carefully. “I don’t know if this’ll piss you off or not, but I really hate your parents.”

You see, I was never the person to be . . . flowery with things. There was no easy way to say that Tweek’s parents were total assholes, so I just said it and hoped for the best. Not the best way to go through life, especially because I’d only been dating Tweek for . . . a week? Week and a half? But I just couldn’t sit there and listen to Tweek talk about his parents. I couldn’t do it.

And luckily Tweek didn’t seem too offended by it. “ _Yeah, I . . . I kind of figured you did._ ”

“Like. A lot.”

“ _I know._ ”

“Like, I don’t know if I’d be able to tolerate a conversation with them.”

“ _I get it._ ”

“If I ever meet them, I probably won’t be capable of being nice --”

Tweek groaned and said, “Alright _, already, Craig! I know, my parents suck! I still have to live with them, so, right now, there’s no point in thinking about it! I just want to spend time with you and forget they exist, okay?_ ”

His words made my insides soften and I smiled at him. “Okay, babe. Let’s forget together.”

* * *

That basically was how I passed the couple weeks of holiday vacation before my parents took me back to college. Tweek and I talked everyday, texting as the bare minimum. We preferred facetime, because then we could see each other, and we wouldn't have to worry about typing out long messages. We could just . . . talk. It was almost as good as being with him. 

Almost.

The morning I was getting ready to leave for College University was fucking glorious. It was a Saturday, which was always a good day regardless, but it was particularly amazing.

It was just my mom that took me, like that summer. I tossed my backpack in the backseat and climbed into the front, my phone and a pair of earbuds in my hand. Mom took her sweet time adjusting the mirrors -- she was always a really prepared driver, even if she wasn’t very good at the driving part -- and, after maybe five seconds of just fiddling with shit, she turned to me and asked, “Ready to go back?”

At her words, I smirked behind my hand and kept my eyes fixed out the window, anxiously waiting for the moment that the houses surrounding my own became a blip in the rearview mirror. I tried to keep my voice as neutral as possible when I said, “I guess.”

But that wasn’t the whole truth. I wasn’t just _ready_. I was fucking ecstatic. And in that moment I was thinking a thought I’d never thought I’d ever think:

 _I can’t wait for school to start_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aha! I managed to work Travis in!
> 
> Also, I just wanted to add here that there is a definite line between Craig's inner monologue and my personal opinion. I want to say here and now that all the 'drug addict' stuff I added in here is all based off of stereotypes. I know that not all users behave like Travis, but this is how CRAIG see addicts. It's just like the Kyle/Cartman thing, (a relationship that I wouldn't support outside of fiction). It's all from the perspective of someone else. 
> 
> Tell me what you think! I love reading review so so much, and thank you for making it this far!


	24. The Perks of Leashing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahhh, I'm sorry this is so late. There have been approximately ten versions of this chapter, I just had so much trouble getting everything right, and I'm still not entirely sure it turned out fully in character. (If you think there's a lot of unnecessary dialogue in this chapter, honestly, the other versions are like so so so much worse.)
> 
> Warning: the last part of this chapter is a smut-ish scene. I tried my hand at one, but I have zero% experience, so it's kind of garbage, but it's there, anyway. It's just smut, and that's it, there's no plot development, so if you decide you'd rather skip it, you aren't missing any major plot points.
> 
> Anyways, as always, please tell me your thoughts, I love to hear them! And I hope you like it!

Apparently, when you can’t wait to arrive somewhere, every second it takes to get there seems like forever.

The first half of the ride back to College University -- a solid hour -- was un-fucking-bearable. I just listened to music and watched the scenic view of the highway and tried to appear casual on the off-chance that Mom glanced over at me. I did see a hitch-hiking midget, and that was about the highlight. Tweek was still on the plane, and the only other people I had to talk to, really, was Clyde, Token, and my mom. But I wasn’t in the mood to talk to _them_ , I was in the mood to talk to _Tweek_ , and he was _on a fucking plane_.

The second half Tweek had finally landed, and was texting me as he took a bus to the college. Just stupid little things like,

_There’s this old man a couple seats ahead of me and he just sneezed so loud the driver swerved and almost hit a trash can._

And,

_I’m currently witnessing with my own eyes a white guy wearing a Cosby sweater._

And,

_If the dumb kid who keeps yanking the wire to get the bus driver to pull over would just get off and never cross paths with me again, that would be fucking awesome._

Every single one made me smile. Which was good, in theory, but I was in close quarters with my mom, and I had to keep my mouth covered, or hidden lest she see the actual expression on my face. So I’m pretty sure that gave her the impression that I was sick, but better that than her thinking I was texting with my boyfriend.

But the best text came just as Mom and I were passing an anti-abortion billboard, and it said:

_Okay, I’m here. Text me when you pull up, okay?_

I couldn’t stop staring at the text, a wide smirk on my face. I was actually giddy with excitement -- Craig Tucker, _giddy_ \-- and Mom was driving _too fucking slow_.

“Are you okay?”

I jumped when I heard my mom talking to me. Clicking the top button of my phone and blackening my screen, I turned my eyes out the window and mumbled, “Um. Yeah. Why?”

“Because you’re shaking,” she said flatly.

I glanced down at my body, and saw she was right. My legs were bouncing irritably, and the hand that wasn’t casually resting on my mouth was tapping an unsteady rhythm against my thigh. I was never one to move around too much, and Mom knew that, so, from her perspective, I definitely must’ve looked sick.

“Do you need me to pull over?”

“No, I’m okay.” Pulling over was the _last_ fucking thing I needed.

Mom didn’t answer, but she also didn’t stop the car, which I couldn’t have appreciated more.

* * *

Finally. I could see the building. My hand was already on the car door handle, and I was fully prepared to sprint my way to my dorm room and away from the extremely awkward almost-tension in the car, when Mom asked,

“Are you sure you’re not dying or something? You’re acting weird.”

I jerked my attention to her and nodded. “Yeah, I’m fine. Can you just pull up front here?”

She quirked her eyebrows, but put her blinker on and pulled to a stop in front of the building. Saying goodbye at the start of the second semester seemed much, much easier than saying goodbye at the start of the first semester -- the bandaid was already ripped off -- and it seemed Mom agreed with me, because all she said was,

“Spring break, I’ll pick you up.”

I nodded at her, and pushed the door open, adjusting my backpack over my heavy winter coat. “Okay.”

“Don’t fail your classes.”

“I won’t.”

“And don’t get anyone pregnant.”

I smirked on the inside, but kept my face perfectly sober. “I won’t.”

“‘Bye, Craig.”

“‘Bye, Mom.” I shut the door, probably harder than was necessary, and hurried down the sidewalk towards the entrance to the building. As I was walking, I sent Tweek a quick text that said,

 _I’m here, walking up the stairs now_ ,

And doubled my speed.

My key was already out of my pocket and clutched in my hand by the time I’d found room 374, but I didn’t have the opportunity to use it: it flew open in front of me, revealing a bright-eyed, wide-smiled Tweek, his face alight with excitement and his shirt rumpled, probably from him twisting on it so much. He was bouncing up and down, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, almost like he didn’t know what to do with himself.

Oh, sweet Jesus. I missed that. I missed him. And, I mean, I knew already that I missed him, it was picking at my brain the second I watched him turn towards his gate, but seeing him again stirred an excitement in my chest that I didn’t feel very often. And I mean . . . he just looked so _happy_ , it made my heart melt, and my cheeks starting hurting from how wide I was smiling.

I took a few steps forward, my plan being to take Tweek back into our dorm room, but I was cut short when Tweek exclaimed, “ _Craig_!” and then did his little giggle laugh. It clicked in my mind what he was about to do, and I had just barely slid my backpack off of my back, preparing for a Tweek explosion, when he ran over to me and hugged me with so much enthusiasm, I was almost knocked off my feet. He buried his face into my chest, and, even though I was still wearing my winter coat, I could feel him nuzzling his cheek against the zipper.

I sighed, wrapping my own arms around him and holding him close to my chest. It didn’t occur to me that we were just . . . in the middle of the hallway, and anybody could’ve walked by, but fuck, it felt so good, it felt _so fucking good_ to touch him again.

“Hey, Tweek,” I said, squeezing his body tightly in the attempt to get as close to him as I could. There was just no way; I couldn’t _possibly_ get as close to him as I wanted to.

He let out a breathy sigh, nuzzling into me. “Hi, Craig.”

I dragged circles into his back, and we just stood like that for a few seconds. Or a minute, I didn’t know, time didn’t feel real. It felt so amazing just to _hold_ him; I didn’t have nearly enough time with him before winter break, and my heart had been actually aching at the fact that Tweek was so far away from me. And it wasn't even that I was _that_ attached to him that I could be away from him for two and a half weeks. I wasn't a fucking Shakespearean teenager girl. I just didn't feel like I had the closure enough to be able to tolerate being away from him so long. If we had been dating longer than one night, it would've been different. But we had been together for not even twelve hours. 

Didn’t help that my mind was torturing me with dreams of us happily living together and being all domestic and shit. It just made me want him more.

“Ngh . . . I missed you,” he muttered to me.

A pleasant bubbling erupted in my chest. “I missed you, too,” I answered.

As soon as the last word left my mouth, a different voice spoke. “Uh. Excuse me. Your bag’s kind of in the middle of the hallway.”

Tweek and I let go of each other quickly. I impulsively dropped my eyes to the floor, forcing myself to realize the situation -- that being Tweek and I hugging it out by a complete stranger -- faster than my brain wanted to. Which meant I was too embarrassed to make eye contact with anyone. Although, really, I didn’t know what we expected; we were just standing in the middle of a busy walkway. Move in week had been happening . . . well, all week, but that Saturday was usually the day that people arrived. There was bound to be some traffic and, because we were on the third floor and people had to lug all their shit back to their rooms, there was _bound_ to be some irritated assholes trying to move past each other.

I looked up at the guy, just so I could remember his face in case I ever ran into him again, (something that, as of that moment, I had no intention of doing). He had tan skin, shaggy blonde hair, and very manly scruff in place of a beard. He was wearing black jeans that had a few holes, (but it didn’t seem like it was on purpose, it seemed like he’d just bought them at Carol’s Collectibles for $5), an unzipped black hoodie over a _Kill Bill_ t-shirt, and a pair of ratty sneakers. He was shorter than me, by maybe three inches. Which meant he was a giant from Tweek’s perspective, but an average guy from my perspective.

But his eyes were what I was most impressed by. They were a greenish color; not quite emerald, but they had this darkish-green tint to them, like an olive.

He was very, very attractive, and, now that I had officially come to terms with how absolutely gay I was, I wasn’t afraid of admitting that. Judging by the quiet hum that came from Tweek, he seemed to agree with me. I mean, that asshole looked like a 21st century Kurt Cobain, and, even though all I’d heard him say was _Excuse me, your bag’s kind of in the middle of the hallway_ , I could tell he had the same raspy-ish voice. Even though the guy sounded familiar, he didn’t look familiar, other than the fact that he looked like the famous lead singer of a famous band. But I had fucking heard his voice before, even if I couldn’t place it.

I decided not to think too much about it. I had other, more important things to think about. “Oh, sorry, dude,” I said, picking my backpack up off the ground and swinging it over my shoulder.

He just shrugged, and didn’t answer.   

I didn’t really care enough to see if he had anything more to say. I just stepped to the side so he could pass us, and hoped he would without me prompting him any more. “Okay. Well. Yeah.” I figured it’d be okay if Tweek and I just walked away without saying goodbye because we had no idea who that guy was. We -- or at least I -- didn’t really want to wait around talking to him.

But he didn’t make a move to indicate he was preparing to leave, and that alone somehow froze me in place, too. The guy folded his arms over his chest and leaned back so it almost looked like he was resting on a wall, even though there was nothing behind him. It was a stance that only, like, _actually_ cool people could manage. Not fake cool like any of the guys from South Park, but _actually_ cool. He had reached cool nirvana. A thought that made me chuckle in my head when I first thought of it.

The guy gave Tweek and I a lopsided smile and said, “How’ve you guys been?”

I exchanged a confused glance with Tweek. “Do we know you?” I asked, looking back up at him. I already knew the answer, but I figured I’d prompt the thought in his head so maybe he’d realize that he was talking to strangers.

“Oh, right, sorry. I’m Jack,” he said, holding a hand out for us to shake. “I’m from the dorm room next to you. We haven’t really talked before.”

Ah. So _that’s_ where I heard his voice. He had my back when Clyde and Token were knocking on the door. Okay. That meant that I liked him. I extended my hand and shook his once, before letting it drop. Tweek did the same. I expected that to be the end of it, (I didn’t even really want to meet him in the first place), but Jeremy started talking again. “Sorry if that was weird, my dad always told me to shake hands when you meet people. Said it was social etiquette or whatever. I want to kick the habit, but I’ve been doing that since I was four. Hard to break a habit of fifteen years.” And then he just . . . _stood_ there, like he was waiting for something.

“Um. Okay. Is there something we can help you with?” I asked, trying to get him to either talk or walk away.

He shrugged, crossing his arms over his chest. “I just wanted to tell you that I kind of heard you two a couple weeks ago.”

I exchanged another confused glance with Tweek. I had no idea what that meant, because Tweek and I were hardly loud ever. Well, _Tweek_ was. But not a whole lot, and definitely not two weeks ago, when he wasn’t even there. “What do you mean?” I asked, turning back to him.

“I mean, I heard you guys, you know. Going at it. You were really loud, just for future reference. Especially blondie.”

I felt horror wash over me at the admission, especially at how nonchalant he was about it. Like it was just normal for him to hear two guys, as he eloquently put it, _going at it_. Tweek seemed to shake beside me even more than he had been before, his mouth spewing a string of nervous and anxious sounds. I swallowed; if I freaked out, then Tweek would freak out even more. I didn’t really want to dwell on it anymore than that, but I did want to at least know if he was a homophobe or not. It could make that conversation either very bad or just mediocre. “Okay, _and_? Is there a _problem_?”

“Oh, no, not at all,” he said, lifting his hands and waving them in front of his chest, like he was surrendering. “Wouldn’t want to pick a fight with you, anyway. You kind of destroyed those homophobic dicks a few months back. I went to high school with them and they’ve always been like that. They totally deserved it.” He sighed. “But, anyway, yeah, I was just curious. So you two are . . .”

It took me a second to realize what he was asking. “Gay,” I answered flatly. I didn’t really worry about Tweek’s reaction to me outing him, because he nodded jerkily and added,

“GAH! For each other.”

My lips twitched upwards, but I forced it away. I wasn’t too sure I liked the conversation we were having with some guy that we didn’t know, but I was calmed somewhat by the fact that Tweek was leaning into my side and holding the sleeve of my coat. It felt good. “Yeah,” I agreed. “Is there something you’d like to say?”

He shrugged again. “I just didn’t know there was anybody else in our building.”

I had no fucking clue what that meant. “Anybody else?” I asked, confused.

Tweek made a noise like he knew what Jack was talking about. “Oh! You’re gay, too?”

Oh. That made sense.

“Yeah,” Jack said casually. “The only other gay guys I know here are taken, and most of them are annoying, anyway. I thought maybe I’d find _someone_ , at least to fool around with or something. I mean, everybody experiments in college, right? I thought maybe I’d help a cute, closeted guy come to terms with his sexuality, and then date him until he dumps me right before graduation, but nope.” He shrugged. Again. He did that a lot. “Still alone.”

I groaned on the inside. Why the hell did he feel the need to tell us that? I couldn’t have cared less, especially because there were several things I’d rather have been doing other than talking to that guy. “Yeah, sorry. We can’t really help you with that.”

He let out a breath, but then gave us another lopsided smile. “That’s alright. It’s just nice to see someone like me be happy. And I like you two. You keep to yourselves. Don’t make too much noise. Well,” he said with a snort, “Except the night before we all left. But that was more hot than it was annoying.” I blushed, and he continued. “You really freaked out my roommate, though. He got all red and put headphones in and played his music so loud I could hear it from the other side of the room.” Jack chuckled. “He’s straight. Really straight. Or maybe he’s gay, I don’t know. I think my gaydar’s broken.”

That actually made me smirk. Their roommate situation sounded a lot like Stan and Kenny, because that was exactly how both of them would react in that situation.

Tweek spoke up after that, saying impatiently, “NGH! Okay, as fun as this is, we haven’t seen each other in two weeks, so --”

Jack full-on laughed, taking a few steps around us. “Say no more. I was actually getting ready to go to the bookstore, anyway. It’s just down the street, and it’s new; it opened right before Christmas. It’s really cool, I’ve been there a couple times. It’s got a gay section, too, if you guys are interested. Well, anyway, I’ll see’ya guys later.”

“‘Bye,” I said as Tweek grabbed my hand and pulled me towards our open dorm room door. I didn’t spare Jack a second glance and followed after Tweek just as eagerly as he pulled me forward. When the door was closed behind us, Tweek grabbed the handles of my chullo, lifted on his toes, and pecked me quickly on the lips.

The whole thing happened so fast that I didn’t have time to respond, and it took a few seconds for the kiss to catch up with me. And when it did, my face heated rapidly, and I reached a hand up to my lips, touching them lightly. I smiled at him, letting out a long sigh. “The honeymoon phase,” I said absently.

Tweek did his little giggle laugh. “Five and a half more months, asshole.”

“Don’t call me an asshole, dickhead.”

He laughed a single laugh, and then grabbed onto the hem of my sweatshirt, lifting up on his toes and pressing his lips to mine again. He didn’t pull away immediately that time, which gave me plenty of opportunity -- opportunity that I took advantage of completely -- to kiss him back. I put a hand to his cheek, and run my fingers through his hair, sighing contentedly into his lips.

But, as much as I wanted to make out with him until our lips fell off, I really missed just _talking_ to him. Just being able to feel him and listen to his shaky voice rant about random shit that made my heart melt. I didn’t know if Tweek was expecting a makeout session, but if he was, I didn’t know if I was willing to partake. I just missed the simplicity of the two of us; how uncomplicated we were.

So I parted our lips, and gripped his shoulders, gently pushing him back a few steps. He seemed to understand even though I didn’t explain, which I appreciated, because, even though Craig Tucker on the inside was fucking Shakespeare, Craig Tucker on the outside . . . wasn’t. Like, _really_ wasn’t; I couldn’t really pull off _romantic_ that well.

I unzipped my coat, letting it drop to the floor on top of my back, and I adjusted my chullo on my head. “So --”

But before I could say anything else, Tweek made a loud screech sound, and exclaimed, “Jesus Christ! I almost forgot! I got you a Christmas present!”

I turned all of my attention to Tweek. “You what?”

Tweek scurried to his side of the room and unzipped his duffle bag, reaching a hand in and digging around excitedly. “A Christmas present! I didn’t wrap it, but I thought that’s probably okay, right?” He glanced over his shoulder at me, as if waiting for me to either condemn him for not wrapping a present that I wasn’t expecting, or to tell him that I definitely didn’t care about the fact that he didn’t wrap a present that I _wasn’t fucking expecting_.

“Tweek, you didn’t have to get me anything,” I said, joining him by his bed. “You don’t even celebrate Christmas --”

“GAH! Well, yeah, but _you_ do,” he said, letting out an annoyed groan, his hands ruffling through his clothes and shit, trying to find whatever it was he got me. “I can’t find it!” he announced, stooping to his knees and renewing his search, a more determined look on his face.

I sighed, and sat myself down on his bed, scooting back so that my back was pressed against the wall, and watched his increasing panic the longer it took him to find my Christmas present. “Seriously, Tweek, you didn’t have to --”

“GAH! Aha! I found it!” he exclaimed, looking up at me with a wide smile. “Close your eyes.”

“But --”

“ERG! _Please_ just close your eyes. And hold out your hands.”

I rolled my eyes and shut them, cupping my hands in front of me. “Well, since you asked _so_ nicely.”

I only had to wait about five seconds before I felt something small being shoved into my outstretched palms. I opened my eyes reflexively, and stared down at the small-ish Christmas present Tweek had so thoughtfully gotten for me. The first thing that registered with me was that it was really, really soft. Like, _really_ soft. And the second thing that registered with me was that it was a stuffed animal. And the third thing that registered with me was that it was a stuffed animal in the likeness of Saturn, my favorite planet. It had small little eyes and a tiny little smile and one of it’s little hands was raised up in a permanent wave. It was fucking adorable.

“EHH! It’s a . . . it’s Saturn. I saw it in a toy store down the street from my house and it made me think of you, and I realized that I hadn’t gotten you anything for Christmas, so I, uh . . . I bought it,” he finished lamely.

I glanced up at him, and felt my heart warm at the nervous half-smile on his face. I smiled, patting the spot on Tweek’s bed next to me, silently asking him to sit down. He did, hesitantly, and stared at me with wide eyes.

“GAH! Do you -- oh, Jesus! -- do you like it?” he asked anxiously, gripping the front of his shirt tightly in his fists.

I wrapped an arm around his waist, and coaxed him into melding into my side comfortably. “I love it. Thank you, honey.”

Tweek let out a relieved sigh, and rested his head on my shoulder. “Ngh . . . good.”

With a chuckle, I added, “How worried were you that I wasn’t going to like it?”

Tweek groaned, turning his face so that his forehead was pressed against my upper arm. “GAH! Shut up.”

I sighed happily, and ran my hand up and down his side. It was nice. Comfortable. I liked touching him. It was grounding.

We just sat there quietly together for a few minutes, before Tweek lifted his head and he said, “Okay, I’m bored. What do you want to do?”

Even though I could do it for hours, Tweek wasn’t good at doing nothing for long periods of time; he had to do something. Drawing, watching TV, playing card games; he needed something to occupy his mind, or he’d get so lost in daydreams that it’d take a lot of effort to shake him out of it. And Tweek didn’t like disappearing into his head for too long, and I guess that was what had happened in that moment. And besides sitting there, there were several things we could’ve done, but I really just wanted to keep it nice and simple. “Let’s keep talking.”

He gave me a weird look through a smile. He probably wasn’t expecting that answer. “Talking? Since when do you want to talk?”

I snorted. I guess he hadn’t caught on to the fact that one of my favorite things to do with him was to just lay there, and talk about random shit. And besides, _I_ didn’t really want to talk, I wanted _him_ to talk. About whatever, anything he wanted. I wanted to listen to him rant about irrelevant things. But I didn’t really feel like explaining that to him, so I said, “Since now.”

“Okay, fine,” he said. “Let’s talk. How was your Christmas?”

I quirked my lips. I was hoping for a more ‘Did LBJ kill JFK?’, conversation, not small talk like ‘how was your Christmas?’, but I knew that, with Tweek and I, small talk always lead to better, more interesting talk, so I rolled with it. “It was okay. My family doesn’t get into Christmas a whole lot. Once Trish and I grew up, it didn’t really feel like that important of a holiday. We got a tree and everything, and exchanged a couple gifts here and there, but it didn’t really mean anything.”

I didn’t care for Christmas much. I wasn’t big into celebrating stuff like that, and my family wasn’t either. When I was younger, they were really into Christmas, but one’s passion for holidays like Christmas dulls with age, and almost all celebration dropped off when Tricia turned ten and stopped believing.

Oh, Jesus, I remember when she first found out. Even though I didn’t have anything to do with it, I actually felt bad that it happened at all. When Tricia was ten, I was fifteen, and we had just moved to Middle Town. You remember those bitch ass kids that took that stuffed dog from her? Well, way before that happened, they told her, and a few of the other girls in her class, that Santa wasn’t real. Just, point blank, without prompt, told them that.

When Trish came home from school that day, she was not happy. She cursed our parents out for lying to her, and called me a dumbass for playing along with them. And, sure, she was mad, but she also seemed really . . . hurt, almost. I imagine it didn’t feel very good for your entire childhood to be discredited by some dickhead eighth graders.

I started to get a little too introspective for my tastes, and wanted to change the subject, so I cleared my throat, and asked, “How was your whatever Buddhists do this time of year?”

Tweek laughed. “Good. I usually meditate extra around Christmas time, just because my parents tend to get . . . weird. I mean, weirder than they normally are.”

I frowned. “Weird how? Why didn’t you mention it before?”

Tweek shrugged, uncommitted. “I don’t know. It was never really a big deal, I guess. I just kind of dealt with it growing up. It’s not so much weird as it is . . .” he quirked his lips, thoughtfully. “It’s like they don’t really understand that I’m not Catholic anymore, and they treat me like I’m _ultra_ Catholic or something.”

It took me a few seconds for that information to sink in because, “Tweek, you’ve been Buddhist since fourth grade.”

“I know.”

“. . . And it’s taken them _this_ long to get it?”

“Well, I mean, they still haven’t. Case in point. I got a new coffee maker for Christmas. And a picture of Jesus to hang in my bedroom.”

I grimaced, because that’s really fucking weird. I was raised Catholic -- as well as about half of South Park -- and that was definitely not a common gift for parents to give their children. There wasn’t a single picture of Jesus hanging up in my house, despite the fact that my parents went to church every Sunday. “Did you actually hang it up?”

He rolled his eyes. “GAH! _No_. I gave it to my neighbor, and told my parents it was my duty to spread the word of Jesus, or whatever.”

“And they bought it?”

“They’re fuckhats, remember? Besides, my shrine’s in my bedroom, and I think a picture of white Jesus would kind of ruin that.”

Ugh. Sometimes I couldn’t believe how awful his parents were. “You should just tell them the truth. That way you can avoid any more Jesus presents.”

Tweek sighed. “I’ve tried. It’s more trouble than it’s worth. I’ve been able to give away every Christmas present they’ve ever given me, and they’ve never noticed. They don’t notice anything.”

“They haven’t noticed your shrine?” I asked.

He snorted. “When I was younger, my mom found it, but she tried to throw it away. She said I shouldn’t let trash build up in my room or I’d get cockroaches. I had to beg the garbage man to give it all back before he drove to the next house.” He rolled his eyes. “So I put a lock on my closet and hide it in there. I just have to remember to take the lock with me when I go inside, because they might lock me in without noticing.”

Yeah. _Without noticing_. I groaned just at the thought, and closed my eyes. His parents were so fucking awful, I couldn’t fucking believe it. I’m not even joking; I thought my parents’ excessively hands-off approach to parenting was decently horrible, (even though I was pretty sure I turned out okay). And I thought Kyle’s mom was bad, and both of Kenny’s parents, and especially _Butter’s_ parents, who I thought were the worst parents imaginable. But Tweek had to prove me wrong every time he talked about them.

And still, it wasn’t the worst thing they’d done to him. I was dreading, but also anxiously waiting for the day he confided that in me. I wasn’t sure if I could take it.

Tweek sighed, jostling me from my thoughts. “I know, Craig. You hate my parents. You don’t have to say it.”

“Do you hate them?” I asked, cracking an eye open.

Tweek’s face was a kind of mixture between sad and contemplative. It took him maybe ten seconds to answer, which was far too long for a question that, I thought, had a simple answer. “I . . . I don’t know. They’ve done a lot of . . . NGH! -- _shit_ to me. I resent them. I don’t think I’d be _sad_ if I never saw them again. But I don’t know if I . . . if I _hate_ them. They're my . . . they're my _parents_ , you know? And hate's a big word.”

I leaned forward and gave him a lingering kiss, because that sad/contemplative look was quickly turning into very sad, and I didn’t want to see that. We had just seen each other for the first time in half a month; I didn’t want to be sad with him. And that kiss worked -- like I knew it would -- and I felt him slowly start to smile against my lips.

I pulled back after a few seconds. “Do you want to stop talking about it?”

He nodded eagerly. “That sounds good, yeah.”

* * *

Tweek and I only laid there for maybe ten more minutes before I guess we both got tired of just staying in the same position. He suggested Go Fish with that new deck of cards he got before our fight, the one with the presidents, and I agreed. I missed Go Fish with him. He built the fort for us, and set up the game in between us as we laid on our stomachs facing each other, and then he told me all about every president on every card. (“Oh, hey, you know Harrison was only president for a month?”, “Madison! I like him, he was a whole two inches shorter than me!”, “Gross, Nixon. You’ve heard about the Watergate scandal, right? Fuck, man, never trust a president!”)

We played until our stomachs started growling. We made some sandwiches for lunch, and I suggested we watch a movie. I had Netflix and Hulu, and I figured I’d let him pick; I was in a generous mood.

“Oh, X-Files!” he exclaimed, immediately moving the laptop cursor to click on the TV show. “We’re starting it now. Right? Is that okay?”

I snorted. “Just start episode one, asshole.”

“Don’t call me an asshole, dickhead.”

A laugh bubbled up from my throat, but I pushed it down, and didn’t respond.

* * *

Three episodes of one of the greatest TV shows to ever exist later, Tweek exited out of the screen before the fourth could play automatically. I turned to him, about to ask him just what the hell was he doing, we were only three episodes deep, I wanted to see what came next even though I’d seen the entire series before and already knew what came next, when he sat up and faced me head on. I copied him, crossing my legs to the side, and tilted my head, waiting for an explanation.

I sucked in a breath when he tugged hard on the handles of my chullo, and brought my forehead against his. It was uncomfortable for me -- unless we were laying down, touching foreheads with him, even if he stretched up, meant I had to hunch over -- but it was worth it to see those wide hazel eyes so close.

“Kiss me a little,” he said, wrapping his fingers around the strings of my hat.

My eyes dropped down to his lips instinctively. I could hardly see him for how close he was, so I brought my eyes back up to meet his. “Okay,” I mumbled, tilting my head and puckering my lips against his.

It was slow at first. But then it wasn’t slow. I ducked my fingers under his shirt and stroked his bare waist and stomach, and he buried his fingers in my hair -- that asshole and hair, I’ll never understand it -- tugging harsh enough to sting, but not harsh enough to hurt. I hummed into his mouth, parting my lips and prodding with my tongue as way to ask him to open for me. He complied with a shiver, his hands jerking and subsequently pushing my hat completely off of my head. Something that I couldn’t have cared less about, even if I tried.

God, I loved him so much.

After a couple minutes of what was _technically_ making out, we separated, and rested our foreheads together. We were slightly out of breath, because we hadn’t really come up for air that entire time, but it was a good out of breath. A pleasant one, if something like that even exists. He smiled at me, and I smiled back, and soon enough we were laughing like a couple of fucking morons.

“I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of that,” I said to him through my laughter.

He laughed even harder at that, pulling away slightly so that we didn’t smack heads. Tweek was one of those people who laughed with his entire body, probably because he wasn’t exactly used to laughing, and his body was always a little taken aback whenever he did. “Jesus, man, me neither.”

“We should do that . . . more often,” I said slowly, watching in amusement as Tweek’s face lit up like a Christmas tree at the proposition. He leaned in, his eyes closing and his lips puckering, but before our lips could touch, someone knocked at our door.

I groaned. What horrible timing for someone to decide to drop by. I whispered to Tweek, “If we’re really quiet, maybe whoever that is will go away.”

Part of me expected him to protest, because, even though he hated people, he wasn’t very good at leaving doors unopened if someone was on the other side, but he nodded, and whispered back, “Okay.”

There was a beat of silence, and then the knocking came again. I shushed Tweek needlessly; he did not seem like he wanted to make any noise at all, and kept his lips pressed tight together.

“Craig, we’re not dumb,” a voice called. Clyde. Ugh. “We know you’re in there. We heard you. And hello to you, too, Tweek.”

I felt a blush crawl up my neck but I still refused to speak. I knew that being quiet worked on them, it worked a few other times before, so there was no reason to believe it wouldn’t work that time, too.

“You’re really not fooling us, Craig,” another voice said. Token.

“You guys can screw each other later,” Clyde added.

I huffed, pulling away from Tweek. “Sorry,” I said to him, regretfully. I didn’t particularly want to stop what we were doing, but the intrusion of Clyde and Token was kind of really killing whatever mood we had just set. And at that point, they really weren’t going to leave until I humored them. I stood up, grabbing my chullo from the floor, and pulled it onto my head irritably.

I opened the door, and immediately glared at them. “What do you want?”

Clyde smirked at me, and I wanted nothing more than to punch his face in. “Well, we just got here,” he said. “And we’ve been in the car for a long time. We wanted to come say hi.”

“Hi,” I said flatly. “Now leave.”

I don’t know what I expected, but let’s just say I wasn’t exactly surprised that they didn’t listen. “There’s a party at Kenny and Stan’s apartment. Just South Park guys, not even the girls,” Token said, stepping in front of Clyde. “Did you want to come? And Tweek too?”

I glanced behind my shoulder at Tweek and raised an eyebrow, silently asking him. He was sitting up straight on the center of our combined mattresses, shaking a little. When he caught my eye, he said, "NGH! Okay!"

“Okay, fine,” I said, turning back to the assholes known as Clyde and Token. “What time do we need to be there?”

“It’s now,” Clyde said. “So if you’re coming.” He gestured out the door with a hand.

I deflated. “Now. Great.” I was very happy that the presence of Clyde and Token had assassinated my boner before it could go beyond half mast, because I wasn’t really in the mood to be sporting a hard on around anyone other than Tweek. “Tweek and I will meet you there in like fifteen minutes.”

Clyde gave me a suspicious look, but he nodded, taking a step away. “Okay, fine. But I will hunt you down myself and --”

“I know, I know,” I said, starting to close the door. “And you’ll drag us there, whether we like it or not, I’ve heard it before. Goodbye.” Before either of them could say anything, I shut the door on them. Turning back to Tweek, I frowned at him and said,

“You realize we’re going to have to face Cartman, right?”

Tweek sighed and nodded. “Yeah, I know. But I’ve missed Kenny, and I want to see him, too.”

And there it was: a moment that would normally make me feel very, very jealous, and yet I found myself not caring. I liked that; I liked not feeling jealousy of Kenny. It was freeing, in a way. “Yeah, and I guess it’ll be okay hanging out with Clyde and Token again.”

“Yeah,” Tweek agreed.

So I held a hand out and helped Tweek to his feet. “Let’s get it over with then,” I said.

* * *

Kenny and Stan’s apartment had been recently cleaned. And smelled better than it usually did, which was like stale beer and that musty vacuum powder smell that’s supposed to smell good but doesn’t.

Tweek and I hung our coats up on the rack, next to the other guys’, who had already settled in. We heard a shit ton of voices coming from the living room, which made me worry briefly that there were more people besides the South Park guys. But, in reality, they just talked super loud because they had never been able to not argue. Tweek and I followed the voices in the direction of the living room, and, when we walked inside, we observed the scene before us, and how unfortunate we were that those assholes were our friends.

My eyes were drawn to the weirdest spectacle of the room: Clyde and Kyle, a box of those Goldfish snack things in between them, taking turns trying to throw Goldfish into Cartman’s mouth. Well, I say _trying_. Fatass caught every single one, it was actually almost amazing. Impressive at least.

Stan was sitting behind the coffee table in the center of room. He was surrounded by a vast array of various alcohols and juices, and a metal bucket full of ice. I guess bartending was a budding hobby of his? I couldn’t imagine him being very good at it, although he was really good at holding down his alcohol, so maybe it was his thing. It was the only career he could’ve had that enabled his binge drinking habit while also providing a somewhat reliable income, so maybe that was a route he _should’ve_ gone down.

And then I saw Token and Kenny talking on a couch, just to the side of where Clyde and Kyle were standing. I raised an eyebrow at the sight. I didn’t see them talking amongst themselves often. I remember, at the beginning of the fall semester when Tweek first met all the guys, that Token said Kenny was “the absolute best person to get drunk with”, but I never really pictured it in my head. They were the furthest of the four gangs of South Park; Stan and I were at the forefront, and Kenny and Token were all the way at the back. They didn’t talk to each other much. At least, I thought they didn’t. I couldn’t imagine what they could even have to say to each other; even though they weren’t exactly opposites, I figured that they were the most different out of everybody, if that makes sense.

Stan handed a small drink over to Token and said, “Martini. Without the olive. I don’t have olives.”

Token rolled his eyes, and took the drink with a blank face. “Thanks, Stan.”

Nobody had noticed Tweek and I yet, which wasn’t something I was particularly bothered by. The longer I could put off talking to those assholes, the better. Tweek squeezed my hand and led me over to the loveseat, the only available seats in the room. How they managed that much furniture on a college budget, I never understood. It didn’t seem realistic. Then again, neither did Kenny pulling all the shit jobs he did, while also being a full-time student, while also having the time to hang out.

I guess Clyde finally noticed us, because I heard his perky voice call over his shoulder, “Hey, Craig! And Tweek!”

“Hey.”

“GAH!”

“‘Bout time you assholes showed up,” Cartman said, his mouth full of Goldfish. “I’m tired of Stan trying to take my innocence with booze --”

“I’m trying out bartending, I need guinea pigs!” Stan insisted indignantly.

If he was messing around with bartending, as a profession apparently, then that meant he didn’t know what he was going to do with his life yet, so I asked, “What are you even majoring in?”

“I’m, uh.” Stan averted his eyes and toyed with a toothpick. “I’m undecided.”

I nodded sarcastically. “Okay. Cool. Sounds like bartending is just perfect for you then.”

Stan glanced up and glared at me. “There’s nothing wrong with not having everything figured out when you’re a freshman!”

“Is that what your mom told you?” I asked. I knew I was being kind of a bitch, but I was in a good mood. If those assholes made my inner South Park come out, then whatever, I didn’t care. It felt good, so fucking sue me.

“No, it’s what Mr. Mackey told him,” Kenny said with a laugh.

Stan reached into the bucket of ice and fished out a large ice cube, tossing it behind him at Kenny’s head. Kenny made a sputtering noise and slapped himself in the face on reflex. It was probably one of the least graceful things I’d ever witnessed.

I turned to Tweek and mumbled, “What does Butters see in him?”

“Butters actually told me one time,” he muttered back. “He said that Kenny was nice to him when nobody else was back in South Park, and that, out of everybody in that town, Kenny’s integrity and morals were the most respectable. And Butters thinks he’s funny.”

I . . . guess I could see the morals thing. Kenny did have a bit of a hero complex, although I mostly just found that annoying. And I did find his overprotection of Tweek nice. I guess. Even though he was protecting him from me. I mean, he seemed like he really cared about Tweek, and that was something I understood. And I remember he loved his sister way more than I loved mine, but, as an older brother, I can also appreciate how much he was willing to do for her.

He was shit at jokes, though, so that last part was bullshit.

“How was your flight, Tweek?” Kenny asked. He had a small smile on his face, and a brownish, uncomfortably ambiguous drink in his hand.

Tweek shrugged, bringing his legs up to his chest. “It was -- GAH! -- okay.”

“Didn’t you fly home?” Clyde asked. “How did you afford a round trip?”

“My dad’s coffee shop does well,” he said simply, resting his head on the back of the loveseat.

Before anyone could respond, Stan reached over with a pale green drink and said, “Tweek. Drink this daiquiri. I wanna know if it’s good.”

I frowned when Tweek took the glass from Stan with shaking hands. He glanced at me, and lifted it up to his nose to smell it. “If you want to know if it’s good, then you drink it,” I said, shooting a glare to Stan. I knew that Tweek didn’t need me to stick up for him; Tweek was clearly capable of that himself, (I should know), but he was also not very good at saying no, unless it was to something that made him very, very uncomfortable, or that he had sworn himself from doing. I knew that he would tell me if something didn’t feel right, in the bedroom or otherwise, but he had been pressured to drink those beers all that time ago, and gave in quickly. That might also have been because he wanted to impress a room full of people that seemed to disapprove of literally everything. Needless to say, it didn’t really work, because he got tipsy after _two_ drinks, but he got props for trying.

Stan rolled his eyes. “It’s got alcohol in it, dude. I know I’m gonna like it.”

I watched as Tweek pressed the rim of the glass to his lips, but, before he could sip at it, I said to him, “Stan’s an asshole, Tweek, you don’t have to drink it.”

Tweek lowered it and gave me a small, almost unnoticeable smile. “It’s -- NGH! -- okay. I’ll only drink one.”

I scoffed, but conceded. It really wasn’t all that big of a deal, and I didn’t feel the need to protect him. If he got tipsy again, then that just meant I’d get to see tipsy Tweek again, and tipsy Tweek was fucking adorable. Very giggly and handsy. But that was just beer; I didn’t know how he’d fair against rum. Didn’t mean I was opposed to finding out. “If you get drunk off of that _one_ daiquiri, then I will lose so much respect for you.”

He shook his head, ignoring my comment, and took a shallow sip.

I watched his face to see if it twisted the way it had when he drank that beer, but he swallowed and grinned. “This is really good! It’s sweet.”

I rolled my eyes fondly. “You and your fucking sweet tooth.”

“It’s way better than that gross beer I had.”

“Nobody told you you had to drink that.”

“I was peer pressured into it, and I can’t be held accountable.”

“I told you not to.”

“Yeah, but I don’t listen to _you_.”

I snorted. “Yeah, I know you don’t.”

When I heard Stan’s voice say, “You know, Craig, I liked you better when you hated everything,” I turned my attention to him and frowned.

“You know, Stan,” I answered, “I liked you better when I completely forgot you existed.”

Clyde laughed and extended his entire body, offering me a fist. “Good one.”

Without thinking, I fist-bumped his hand and said, “Thanks.”

* * *

About forty-five minutes and too many irritated eye rolls later, Tweek turned to me and said, “I’m gonna run to the bathroom.”

I nodded, and, when he left the room, I pulled my phone from my pocket, held my finger over the sensor and tapped on the twitter app. I scrolled through my feed absently, because nobody was talking to me, and I didn’t know what else to do.

“Hey Craig.”

I looked up and saw Stan holding out a glass with with an orange-ish colored drink in it. I just stared at it, because why the fuck did fucking Marsh make me a drink? It was weird enough that he gave one to Tweek, but he should’ve known better than to give one to me. I knew that we had moved past the rival ship we’d had back in South Park, but that didn’t mean we were on the best of terms. I still kind of hated him, and I knew he didn’t hate me anymore, but the fact still stood that I didn’t care whether or not the hatred was mutual; my emotions did not rely on other people to make sense. He was an asshole. Simple as that.

When he saw I wasn’t going to take it, he gestured to it with his head and said, “It’s a screwdriver. I remember you saying you liked vodka.”

At the word ‘vodka’ I grimaced, and immediately held a hand up, shaking my head. “Um. No.”

He frowned. “What? Come on, dude, just drink it, you’re the only person here besides Kenny who likes vodka --”

“Seriously, dude, I don’t want it.”

“I need an outsiders opinion, and I know you won’t sugar-coat it --”

“No.”

“But --”

“I said no.”

“Just smell it.”

I raised an eyebrow. That was a dumb as fuck question. “You want me to . . . smell it.”  

He huffed irritably. “Smell’s a big deal when it comes to taste, right? So if you won’t just fucking drink it, then at least smell it, tell me if it smells good.”

I furrowed my eyebrows. I . . . guessed smelling it wasn’t that bad. I knew I wasn’t going to drink it, because I never liked screwdrivers, too much fruit, so I didn’t think anything bad would come from it. It was going to smell like orange juice, anyway, because vodka doesn’t smell like anything. But I wanted to appease him so he would leave me alone, so I took the glass from Stan’s hand and brought it up to my nose, inhaling deeply. I glanced up at him blankly. “Vodka doesn’t smell like anything. This smells like orange juice.”

“Yeah, no shit.”

I felt Tweek’s presence before I saw him or heard him. I immediately tensed up, because he had kind of jumped into the conversation at a bad time. “Craig, what are you doing?” Tweek asked, and, when I glanced at him, sitting beside me on the couch, he was staring at the drink in my hand suspiciously. I didn’t know if he knew what a screwdriver looked like, or if he’d even heard me say vodka, but he definitely seemed more skeptical than I think he normally would’ve been.

I averted my eyes, and handed the drink back to Stan. “I was just smelling it.”

“GAH! What is ‘it’?”

Stan rolled his eyes. “It’s a screwdriver. Craig ‘I love vodka’ Tucker’s too pussy to drink it.”

Tweek had a similar reaction that I did to the word ‘vodka’, although he honestly looked like he was about to strangle me. Or Stan. Whoever said the wrong thing next. “Vodka?” he asked tightly.

I didn’t want to get into an argument, so I wrapped an arm around his shoulders and patted him reassuringly. “I was just smelling it. I promise.”

He narrowed his eyes at me. “You swear?”

I gave him a smile. “I swear.”

“Jesus, Craig, your bitch put a leash on you already?” Cartman called loudly from the other side of the room. I didn’t realize he was paying attention to an exchange that had absolutely fucking nothing to do with him.

“Two things,” I said blankly. “One. Tweek’s not a bitch and I suggest you not say that again if you want to keep your testicles. Two. Not only do I not _want_ vodka anymore, but I can’t _have_ vodka anymore. And, even though Tweek has to do with it, it was my decision, too. But not only _that_ , it’s also not any of your fucking business.”

“Yeah, and you’re one to talk, Cartman,” Kenny said, rolling his eyes. “Kyle has you on one of the shortest leashes I’ve ever seen.”

“I’ll have you know I’m a free man; Kahl has no control over me,” Cartman said, folding his arms over his chest and giving Kenny a light glare. “And you’re one to talk, too. You’re not even _on_ a leash anymore, Butters is just holding your collar.”

Kenny smirked and nodded. “Yep. And I’m proud of it.”

“Speaking of leashes, we should get Token a girlfriend,” Clyde announced abruptly. It was a completely random topic of discussion, and it seemed like pretty much everybody else in the room was just as confused as I was.

Token huffed, like he knew where Clyde’s sudden conversation shift was coming from. “That’s okay --”

“No, you’ve been single since Nichole moved away when we were sophomores, you need to get out there again.”

Token groaned. I’m assuming he didn’t like Clyde bringing up his ex, which, you know, _made sense_. “Really, I’m fine --”

“No you’re not,” Clyde said, giving Token a weird, disappointed glare. “You’ve been pining after her for forever.”

“And I’m perfectly okay with that --”

“Well, _I’m_ not,” Clyde argued. “You’re a handsome, eligible bachelor. Girls would kill to be with you.”

“Besides, you’re black,” Cartman said. “Which means you’ve got a massive dick.”

Like I’m sure everyone expected, Kyle didn’t seem too impressed with his boyfriend’s statement. “Cartman,” he said in a warning voice, giving Cartman a sharp glare.

“Yeah, yeah, calm your tits, Jew.”

“Don’t test me, fatass!”

Cartman smirked, and poked Kyle’s cheek. “I’m not.” He poked him again. “If I’m bugging you, I don’t mean to, Kahl.” He poked him again, completely ignoring the glare that Kyle was drilling into his face. “I’m not bugging you, am I, Kahl?” Another poke. “Because if I’m bugging you, just tell me.” Another poke. “Maybe I’ll stop.” Another poke, and then --

“ _Alright, stop it!_ ” Kyle shouted, whapping Cartman harshly on the back of the head.

“Ay, fuck you, Jew!”

“Quit belittling my people, asshole!”

“Guys!” Clyde interrupted. “Stop changing the subject! We’re talking about Token, and the fact that he’s been single for three years, _and_ he’s still a virgin. We’re in college, that has to change.”

Token actually scowled. “ _Clyde_ ,” he said firmly, harshly, defensively. Which made sense, because that’s not really something you should announce in a room full of people.

So of course Cartman jumped all over it. “Wait, wait, wait, hold on a second,” he said, his voice leaking with excitement at the fact that he had ammunition to make fun of Token. Token never really gave Cartman a reason to make fun of him at all, because he didn’t really do anything dumb, although him being black gave Cartman plenty. “Token ‘big-dicked’ Black has never had sex before? Even a little bit?”

“How do you have a little bit of sex?” Stan asked, taking a swig of the screwdriver he had tried to pawn off on me.

“Like . . . I don’t know, a blow job or something.”

Token cleared his throat. It was difficult to tell if he was blushing or not, but he started nervously fidgeting with the third martini Stan had made him, swirling the liquid in the glass in tight circles. “Nichole.” He said her name softly, like he hadn’t said it in a very long time, and that it hurt to pass his lips. “She, uh. Wanted to wait.”

There was a long stretch of silence, before Kenny said, “Okay, I’m with Clyde. We need to get you . . . I don’t know, laid, at least.”

“I second that,” Stan said. “As a guy suffering blue balls as we speak, I don’t want that for you, Token.”

Clyde seemed very excited that he wasn’t alone in his very slanted opinion. He turned to me, a wide smile on his face. He did that a lot. He looked to me to see if I agreed with him, even though my approval didn’t matter, because even if I told him not to do something, he was probably going to do it anyway. “Craig, are you gonna help?”

I blinked at him, and turned my eyes to Token, who looked like he wanted nothing more than for death to appear and swallow him whole. “Do you want us to set you up?”

“I would actually hate that a lot,” Token answered immediately.

I looked back to Clyde and shook my head. “Then no, I’m not gonna help.”

Token cracked a smile in my direction. “Thanks, Craig.”

I shrugged. To me, it was a logical response. I mean, if Token didn’t want help, why give him help? It wasn’t like he had a meth addiction, or was doing anything bad. He was just living his life. And I could respect that.

“Fine,” Clyde said, moodily. “Don’t help. We can do it without you.”

I shrugged again. Whatever.

“Kyle, you in?” Stan asked.

I looked over at Kyle. He had a contemplative expression on his face. “I’m in,” he saw slowly. “But only to mitigate the situation.” He sent a half-frown to Token. “I’m sorry, but they’ll totally fuck this up without an unbiased participant.”

“Shut up, Kyle, you like the drama just as much as the rest of us do,” Kenny said rolling his eyes.

“That’s not true,” Kyle protested, eyebrows furrowing.

“It’s totally true,” Stan said, downing the rest of the screwdriver.

“Okay, I’ve got one,” Cartman said, “Tweek, you remember Amanda, from physics? She’s cute, she’d be perfect for Token.” When Kyle’s posture straightened, and his mouth opened to, no doubt, spit bitchy reprimands, Cartman added, “And let me emphasize, _Kahl_ , that she’s a _girl_. Meaning, I don’t want to do anything with her.”

Kyle grumbled, settling back down in Cartman’s lap irritably.

“GAH! Yeah, I -- NGH! -- remember her,” Tweek said. “But she’s already _in_ a relationship, remember?”

“She’s dating an Asian guy,” Cartman said, waving Tweek off. “Their relationship wouldn’t last, anyway.”

“Let me guess,” Token said, his voice flat and unimpressed. “She’s black?”

“Well,” Cartman said, a smile on his face that clearly read, _‘duh’_. “Yeah.”

Token sighed. “I honestly don’t know what I expected.”

I could see in Token’s eyes that he was ready to just give up and roll with whatever the other guys had planned for him. I was starting to feel actually really bad for Token. He had told those assholes several times that he didn’t want their help, and they were prepared to give it to him without his permission, and that sucked. “You don’t have to play along, Token. Just hang out with Tweek and I.”

“Yeah!” Tweek agreed, nodding his head wildly. “Just hang out with me and Craig!”

“We won’t try to force women on you,” I said.

“No way, real friends get you laid,” Kenny insisted. “It worked with you and Tweek, and it worked with Kyle and Cartman, and look! Everyone’s happy!”

“You didn’t _get_ us anything,” I responded. “And besides, we have relationships. With people that we, you know. Actually _like_. If Token doesn’t want a string of one night stands, then you shouldn’t make him have a string of one night stands.”

“We’re not gonna make him do anything,” Stan answered. “We’re just gonna . . . introduce him to some people and see what happens.”

I groaned at that. Jesus, it’s like they all lacked working ear canals. I glanced at Tweek out of the corner of my eye and saw that he had a matching frown on his face. I was happy he agreed with me, and I leaned towards him to whisper in his ear, “I hate them. I hate them so much.”

He did a quiet version of his little giggle-laugh and whispered back, “You don’t hate _them_ , you hate the majority of their personalities.”

I chuckled, and leaned back giving him a smile. “Is one really better than the other?”

Tweek gave me a smile back. “No. But one makes you look like a total asshole, and the other makes you look like a half asshole.”

A half asshole.

Huh.

Leave it to Tweek to come up with something so fucking ridiculous.

* * *

By the time Tweek and I escaped them, the sun had already been set for hours. It was cold outside, but it wasn’t snowing and it wasn’t raining, so we didn’t rush home, instead swinging our arms with our hands clasped together and watched the sky.

“Do you think stars ever get cold?” Tweek asked after a long stretch of silence.

I looked down at him with an amused grin. “No. Because if a star gets cold, it’s not a star anymore. Stars are hot, that’s kind of their thing.”

Tweek hummed, but he had a far-off expression on his face. He wasn’t capable of thinking logically; he was in daydream mode. Alcohol apparently did that to him. I wasn’t bothered, though; I liked him in daydream mode, it just meant he spouted out random shit, and it was always fucking adorable.

“I bet they get lonely, though,” he continued.

“Considering they aren’t sentient beings, I don’t think they do.”

“Sentient or not, they’re like miles away from each other. Wouldn’t you get lonely if you were miles away from anybody that was like you?”

“I got lonely when you were miles away from me, but I am also capable of emotions like loneliness.”

Tweek looked up me at with his wide, hazel eyes, a smile on his face. “Yeah, but we were only a part for two weeks.”

“You say that like it’s nothing.”

He rolled his eyes. “Stars are lonely forever. Until they burn out and die, they’ll always be lonely. It’s kind of sad, isn’t it?”

I tilted my head. “If you want to think about it like that, I guess so. But they have no central nervous system allowing them to experience human emotions. They’re just . . . light and energy. They don’t even know they exist, so I don’t think they’d be able to complain about how boring their existence actually is.”

“I would hate to be a star,” Tweek said, a thoughtful frown on his face. “I hate being alone. And there’s not even anything interesting to look at.”

“And, you know, you wouldn’t be sentient, so . . .”

“You’re making this way less magical than it is.”

“Stars aren’t very magical, are they?”

“You just haven’t seen one before.”

I looked up at the sky briefly, before catching his eye again. “Um. I don’t know what to say to that.”

He stroked the back of my hand with his thumb, sending a flutter up my hand and arm and sparking my heart. “Tomorrow, I’ll draw you a star. Then you’ll see one.”

I smiled at him. “I can’t wait, babe.”

He did his little giggle-laugh, and we walked he rest of the way in silence.

* * *

When we entered our dorm room, I switched my lamp on and shed my heavy coat. I heard Tweek behind me doing the same thing, and, as I turned around to ask him what he wanted to do, (after all, it was only 11:30, we were used to staying up for another four hours), he flung his arms around my neck and pressed his mouth against mine.

I jolted, and stared at his closed eyes. I . . . hadn’t expected that. Maybe I should’ve, but my stomach was full of innocent butterflies; I wasn’t exactly thinking about . . . that. But pulling away wasn’t even a thought in my brain, even if I _was_ completely taken off guard, and, after maybe half a seconds thought, I shrugged in my mind and gripped at his waist, shutting my eyes and sliding my lips along his.

We pulled back an indeterminable amount time later, just to observe each other’s reactions. I wasn’t sure what my face looked like, but he had a look in his eyes that I had only seen on one other occasion, and I think you know what occasion I’m talking about.

“Okay,” I said in response to his expression, even though he hadn’t said anything.

He nodded, and pulled me into another kiss, that one more . . . um, _hungry_ , I guess is the right word for it. But that last part was probably because Tweek’s tongue had somehow made it’s way into my mouth, curling itself around my tongue. Like the last time we’d kissed that deep, I tried to respond as best as I could, but I somehow felt like I wasn’t keeping up with Tweek, like he was somehow _better_ at it than me. Despite my insecurities, though, Tweek didn’t show any signs of discomfort; every response I’d gotten from him was _extremely_ positive.

But, as fucking awesome as it was -- trust me, I’m not trying to downplay it at all -- my back was starting to get a little sore constantly bending over to meet him, so I pulled back just a fraction of an inch -- feeling a little gross, but mostly turned on, by the saliva that was all over my lips -- and in a fit of . . . um, passion? I bent down, gripped the backs of his thighs, and lifted him up. With a surprised squeal, he wrapped his legs and arms around me tightly, pressing his cheek harshly against mine, like he was silently telling me not to drop him.  

“I got you,” I mumbled into his ear, placing a kiss to the edge of his cheek. I liked carrying Tweek. It made me feel good; I knew that Tweek was safe when he was in my arms. Like when I beat up those jock assholes all that time ago; the second they were unconscious, I had my hands all over him, whether I realized it or not, because having my hands on him meant he wasn’t in any danger. And, whether I realized it or not, I liked it. I liked it then, and I love it now.

And, besides. He was really fucking hot, and I think it’s only natural for people to want to touch hot people. And, because he was so close to me -- with his legs completely wrapped around me, his ankles crossed behind my back -- I could actually feel his arousal quite clearly against my stomach, and that spurred me into action again.

Taking a few steps with him in my arms, I knelt down and deposited him on one of the mattresses, and followed after him immediately, climbing on top of him and propping myself above him. My heart thumped in my chest, racing faster than my thoughts, as I stared down at Tweek’s plump-lipped, half-lidded, pink-faced expression. I didn’t know exactly what we were about to do, I just knew that we were probably going to be naked soon, and I was all for that.

Tweek’s hands cupped my neck, and he pulled me close to him. “That was hot,” he said, voice just above a whisper, his breath spreading across my mouth and cheeks.

With a small shiver, I answered, “I did it to you in a dream once. Or twice.” I chuckled, feeling myself go a little half-lidded. “Okay, so a lot of times. Point is, I’ve been thinking about it for awhile.”

A sheepish smile crossed his lips, but I didn’t really want to talk anymore. I’d done enough of that that day, as far as I was concerned, so I caught his lips in another kiss, as a way to show him how badly I wanted to go further. He kissed me back, and, a short while later, he started to slowly grind his hips up into mine.

I groaned, but, as much as I wanted to keep doing that, we were both still wearing all of our clothes, and I didn’t want to soil another pair of boxers just because I didn’t have the fortitude to strip first. And besides, we had _just_ started our little . . . sexual thing; as hard as I was, I didn’t want to rush it and have it be over with before my body could actually appreciate the feeling. So I rolled onto my back and pulled Tweek on top of me, wrapping my arms tightly around his waist and trapping him into my chest. He seemed a bit startled at his change of position, but he adjusted himself so that he was straddling my waist, his hands resting along my jawline, his fingers tickling my cheeks. And when he kissed me again, I let out a long, content sigh, gripping tightly at his sides.

Because _that_ was home right there. With my Tweek spread out on top of me, his lips kissing me in that trembling way that was so endearingly _Tweek_. If I had to be away from him for two and a half week just to get the satisfying relief of simply kissing him, then so fucking be it; it was indescribable.

I tucked my hands under the hem of his long-sleeved shirt, and, as if I were on auto-pilot, I groped him more confidently than I had the first time, because I knew what sounds he made when I was doing something he liked. They were high-pitched mewls, and there was a steady stream of those entering my mouth as we kissed. And the sounds he was making, paired with the small, warm hands brushing through my hair and caressing my cheeks, was making, um . . . okay, I’ll be blunt: my dick get a little very excited. And the weight of Tweek resting on top of my body wasn’t helping that even a little bit.

Despite the pins and needles that coursed down my spine, the over abundance of clothing was starting to annoy me. Even my curious, desperate hands were starting to get irritated at the fact that they had to keep brushing Tweek’s long-sleeved shirt out of the way. It was un-fucking-acceptable.

I cracked an eye open and mumbled against his lips, “Can I shirt?”

Okay, so I blame my stunted awareness on the incapacitating situation, and the sensation was making me delirious. _So_ , it took a few seconds, and a giggling Tweek, for me to realize that I totally fucked up that question. “I mean, can I take off your shirt?” I corrected, dismissing the heat in my cheeks in favor of admiring the dopey grin on Tweek’s face.

“Yes, you can shirt,” he answered, sitting up and straddling my hips to give me actual room to be-shirt him, and he pushed his chest out. I quickly got to work, pulling the buttons through the way-too-fucking-small holes, and I again mentally thanked Tweek for being so terrible at buttoning his shirt. I nipped at his jawline as I maneuvered my way down, trying not to get distracted by his breathy giggles.

It only took me like, ten seconds to get the front of his shirt wide open, and I took a moment to silently praise his soft, pale skin, and the wave of goosebumps that stood at attention the longer he was exposed to the somewhat chilly air. He had his arms relaxed and to his sides, giving me complete control of undressing him, which I did so slowly, just so I could see the relieved smile on his face as he was freed from the thick fabric.

I peeled the sleeves off of his arms, smiling faintly when he seemed to come back to life and shake the cuffs off of his wrist when they got stuck. While he was resituating himself, I yanked my sweatshirt up and over my head, and then immediately discarded my NASA t-shirt (navy blue), and threw it in the same general direction as all of our other articles of clothing.

I turned my attention back to him, pecking his lips briefly and asking, “Lay on your back?”

Tweek nodded quickly, slipping out of my arms and rolling onto his back, instinctively parting his legs.

Ah. Tweek’s legs. I was very fond of them. Even though he was still hidden underneath a pair of blue jeans, they were still there, and I knew they were still there. I was slightly less nervous the second time around, but Jesus fucking Christ, if the thought of Tweek’s bare legs didn’t absolutely kill me.

As alluring as the sight of a spread-legged Tweek was, it wasn’t really what I was going for. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I really, _really_ liked being in between his legs, but what my sex-driven brain was planning didn’t involve me being there.

I moved my body so that I was sitting on my knees _beside_ him, the fingers of one hand curling around his wrist and pinning an arm above his head, and the other hand gripping at his bare waist. I leaned down, nuzzling his head back with my nose, and I placed gentle kisses along his neck. He moaned softly, and reached up absently, almost like he was on autopilot, and massaged my scalp with his thin fingers.  

Eventually, my soft kisses turned into light nips, and then those light nips turned into me just blatantly sucking at his skin, my tongue wetting the spots that would probably turn into noticeable hickies. He was sweating, so it tasted faintly like salt, but it wasn't really the taste that drove me. It was the idea of my licking at his skin, and also the moans that were spilling from his mouth. 

I guess I was teasing him without realizing it, because at some point, Tweek whined, “Ugh. . . _Craig_. . .” in an almost impatient tone.

Lifting my head up, I focused on his eyes to see what exactly I’d been doing to him, and fuck, I guess I’d been doing a lot to him, because there was liquid lust staring right back at me. “Yes, Tweek?”

He let out a huffing sound. “Ngh, you . . . just . . . _seriously_!”

I chuckled, even though I had no idea what he was trying to say. He was just so fucking cute, I could hardly handle it. And, because the pressing in my chest -- a pressing with a more innocent nature -- was so firm, I found myself saying to him, “You’re cute.”

Tweek groaned. “I’m not cute.”

I chuckled, giving him a kiss on the cheek, and then another on the nose, while still maintaining my soft caresses on his waist. “Yes you are. You’re so cute. Fucking adorable.” I rested my forehead on his, and soaked in the almost desperation on his face. God fucking _dammit_ , Tweek was going to be the fucking death of me.

Keeping my eyes boring into his, and making sure his eyes were staring right back, I moved the hand that I had stroking his waist to the soft skin of his stomach, dragging my fingertips along the strip of skin right before the hem of his jeans. When he shivered underneath me, I whispered to him,

“Can I touch down here?”

Tweek’s eyes somehow grew even more hazy and unfocused, his breathing turning into labored pants, but he seemed to get the question easily enough. “Fuck, man. Do whatever you gotta do.”

So not the most logical response, but I understood what he meant.

Here, I’ll pause. Because . . . okay.

Now.

I’d seen a few other dicks in my lifetime, (in the locker room, accidental flashes when me and my friends got dressed in the same room, a few horror movies I’d seen that had random cock shots for no reason, and, you know, porn), but never in that context and never someone I had cared so much about. And I had never . . . _touched_ one before. Besides my own.

So I was nervous.

My fingers were trembling -- just a little bit, though -- as I palmed him through the coarse fabric of his jeans. The second I made contact, Tweek shuddered and moaned and squirmed, his hips lifting into my hand when I stroked him slowly.

“Jesus, Tweek,” I said, leaning down and swallowing his moans with my lips. My pants were painfully cramped, and the heat underneath my hand that made Tweek’s body a part of the physically-male population, paired with the small, trembling hand that was clutching at my head was making me slightly dizzy. But the good kind of dizzy. The kind of dizzy that promised a mind-blowing orgasm sooner than later.

After a few seconds, I finally got up the courage to slide my fingers to the button of his pants, and I slowly undid it, pulling down the zipper. I parted our lips softly and brought my eyes up to meet his. Everything I did needed to be low, deliberate, and gentle. We were reaching territories that could destroy a relationship horrifically if done the wrong way, and I wanted it to be absolutely perfect, for him and me. He was watching my movements with rapt attention, teeth gnawing his bottom lip and soft whimpers escaping from his throat every time my hand moved.

When all that shit was done, I hooked my fingers underneath the hem, and started to pull them down. When I realized I probably wasn’t going to be able to do that without Tweek’s help, I tapped his waist a few times to get his attention and said, “Lift your hips.”

Tweek lifted his hips, but did me one better and just yanked frantically at his jeans until they were down to his knees. Had my heart not been beating out of my chest, I would have snorted at the desperate, excited look on his face, and I pulled them down the rest of the way, helping him kick them off his socked feet. And then the only thing in the way of my Tweek’s dick was his boxers. They were red, and had little coffee cups on them, and it made me smile even more.

I stroked his hip and said, in the attempt to lighten the humidity of the room, “Cute boxers, Tweek.”

“Don’t tease me, man,” he whined, swiveling his hips in tight circles. “Touch me again.”

I blinked. I . . . couldn't say I expected him to be _that_ demanding, but fuck if it wasn't hot. “Okay,” I said dumbly, turning my attention to his clothed dick. It was very pronounced through the red fabric, but the head was peeking out at the top, and I swallowed at the sight. I wasn’t entirely sure what to . . . do with it. Like, just like . . . would I just do it like I did it to myself? I figured that was probably what I should at least start with, so I hooked my fingers around the hem of his boxers, my entire face scarlet and purposefully not looking at his face. I needed complete concentration.

I pulled his boxers down, and felt my entire stomach -- all the compartments and whatever else, all of biology exited my brain as soon as the final was over -- flip over at the sight of his freed dick, resting on his stomach.

So. My first dick. And, if I had my way, my last one. Well, not my _last_ one. I hoped that that encounter with Tweek would repeat more than several times throughout the years, but I had no intention of finding a new dick. I was perfectly fine with Tweek’s dick. It was a nice dick.

I shimmied Tweek out of his boxers, and pulled them off completely, tossing them in some vague direction behind me. When I turned back and caught his eye, I felt my heart seize at the realization that my Tweek was before me, completely naked, hard and panting. I swallowed down the nervousness in my chest, and leaned over him, placing a short peck on his lips, before climbing off of the mattress and rising to my feet. Tweek started to sit up curiously, but, in place of a solid explanation, I just said,

“I’m still wearing pants.”

And that shut him up pretty quickly.

I fumbled with the button of my jeans. It was a moment reminiscent of the first time anything sexual happened between Tweek and I; Tweek was laying on my bed, waiting for me to get undressed, and I was trying not to freak out or melt into a puddle of hormones. I was sweating a little, so it was kind of hard to get my jeans off because the denim kept sticking to my legs, but I eventually got them down to my ankles, and I kicked them off _very_ ungracefully. And when I was down to my boxers -- navy blue, like every other pair of boxers I own -- I found myself hesitating.

Nobody had ever seen my dick before. Not in a sexual setting like that. I felt compelled to cover myself. It wasn’t out of, like, a lack of self esteem, or prudity, but I guess it was more of a vulnerability thing. You can’t get more vulnerable than being naked with the person you love. But I swallowed that away when I looked at Tweek and saw how eager he was.

Because who was I to deny him?

I averted my eyes so I could focus on what I was doing. I grabbed at the hem of my boxers and pulled them down, letting out an involuntary sigh when my dick was no longer confined by any fabric at all. The air was chillier than I had thought, and I shivered a bit.

“ _Jesus Christ,_ ” Tweek hissed and my attention jerked back to him. His legs were sprawled out in front of him, his posture straight, and his hands buried in his hair.

I quirked my eyebrows. That was not a reaction I was expecting, nor was it very favorable. It threw me off of the rhythm Tweek and I had made, and I was kind of relying on that. “What?”

But Tweek just stared at my dick for a verylong time, before mumbling, like an afterthought, and as if he thought I couldn’t hear him, “I don’t think I can fit that whole thing in my mouth.”

It took a second, but those words eventually made sense to me, I’m pretty sure I short circuited. And, even though I already knew what I looked like, I glanced dumbly down with a renewed spatial awareness. “Oh. Uh . . . thanks, I guess.”

Something about my words made Tweek whine softly, and I didn’t really know what to make of that. So I glanced back up at him. He looked nervous -- although that was a given -- but there was also a sober thoughtfulness, too. I was about to ask him what was wrong, when he beckoned me towards him with a flimsy hand.

I obeyed without a second thought, kneeling down and sitting beside him. I didn’t know what to do next. I mean, how could I? It wasn’t like I’d been in that situation before; the last time I’d been in bed with Tweek, it was completely on impulse; between kisses and touches there were hardly any pauses, no beats of inactivity to catch our breaths and collect ourselves. But now that I had the chance to collect myself, I didn’t know what to do. Did we just kind of . . . go for it? Like just start kissing again and lose ourselves, like we’d been doing? Or was there some sort of gay protocol that I hadn’t learned yet?

While I was silently freaking out, Tweek put a hand on my knee and looked at me from under his eyelashes. “Can I. Um. You know. Touch it?”

I swallowed. For me, that was a yes and a no answer question. Yes, because _fuck_ yeah I wanted my boyfriend to touch my dick, and no, because . . . fuck, I was _nervous_ and shit. It wasn’t really a _no_ , it was more of a . . . _my heart’s about to fly right out of my fucking chest, and the second you touch me, I’m absolutely positive it will_.

But I didn’t want to complicate anything, and the look in his eyes kept me grounded. So I said, keeping my voice as steady as I could keep it, “Yeah.”

Tweek smiled at me, and put a hand to the front of each of my shoulders, pressing gently. “Lay back, okay?”

I raised an eyebrow, but decided to listen to him, and reclined onto my back, propping myself up the combined pillows of me and Tweek. I didn’t want to question him, because he seemed very determined to do whatever he was about to do, so I just relaxed and waited.

And my patience was definitely fucking rewarded. Tweek crawled forward so that he was hovering over me. In that position, he looked really fucking tiny, but also really fucking hot, and I had to resist grabbing at my own dick just looking at him.

I watched with bated breath as he reached a hand up to my chest, and placed it over my heart, but I couldn’t take my eyes away from his face, not even for a second. You know, in that moment, Tweek probably could’ve asked me to do anything, and I would’ve done it. I laid all my trust him; he had more power over me than I’m sure he realized. Laying underneath my Tweek, I had pretty much completely lost my free will.

He pecked my lips, once, twice, three times, and then turned his attention to my neck. He _had_ to’ve had experience, although I figured he probably would’ve mentioned it, out of guilt more than anything. He was just really, really good at what he was doing. I let out a shaky breath when he started sucking on my pressure point, and I groaned embarrassingly loudly when he bit down gently on my skin. My hands reflexively latched onto his waist, just so I could have something to hold on to, to keep me steady.

I felt him smirk -- that fucking asshole -- as he kissed his way past my collar bone and nipped and licked at my chest, one hand stroking along my sides and stomach, and the other brushing deliberately against my nipple. “Oh, fuck,” I cursed, before biting hard on my bottom lip to keep any more sounds from escaping. I didn’t expect that to feel that good. And I wondered how Tweek knew that that was going to feel that good.

But, going off of the soft little giggles and his very obvious grins, he was aware just how much he was getting to me. I let out more shaky breaths as I watched him, his cheeks pink and his lips flushed and wet as he worked his way further and further down.

It was frustrating. He was clearly doing his best to avoid touching my dick, and my nerves appreciated his procrastination -- or teasing, whatever -- but my horny-ness did _not_. I hadn’t yet reached the point of no return, but it was rapidly descending upon me, and Tweek was still moving so goddamn slow.

He shifted so that he was knelt between my legs, his hands on my thighs and his mouth kissing down just past my belly button. He stopped abruptly and lifted his head, his wide eyes asking me the question before his lips could. I nodded and said quickly, “Do whatever. I give you permission right now to do whatever you want.”

Tweek brightened, a wide smile on his face, and after that there was no hesitation. He spread his hands evenly on my thighs, and lowered his head, kissing the tip of my dick long enough for me to jolt, but brief enough for me to get irritated and want more. I didn’t have to wait for long, though, because, without warning, he wrapped his lips around the first inch, and flicked his tongue across the head. My hips jolted upwards without my permission, and about 3/4 of my dick disappeared past his flushed lips.

He lifted his head, sputtering a little bit, putting a hand to his chest as he caught his breath.

I groaned, a little annoyed with myself for accidentally choking my boyfriend. I sat up some, and gave him a gentle kiss on the forehead. “Shit, I’m sorry, honey.”

Tweek cleared his throat, and recovered faster than I’m sure I would’ve. He gave me a reassuring smile. “It’s okay, I’m okay. Just wasn’t expecting that. I’ll go slower.”

Okay, so I wasn’t entirely sure I wanted that, but I didn’t have the chance to say anything, because he started in again. Only he didn’t put his mouth around me, he dragged his tongue from the base, very slowly to the tip, and then back again. He kept his eyes on me the entire time, his eyes wide, pupils blown, and gaze fixed to my face. The only time he looked away was when he lost control of my dick with his mouth and had to readjust the situation with one of his hands.

My brain was going haywire, my thoughts reaching full-on Shakespeare level.

 _Oh my God, he’s so fucking cute, look how fucking hot he is, Jesus, he’s the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen, holy fucking shit balls I can’t even feel my fucking heart anymore_.

The most romantic fucking inner monologue ever.

I was getting antsy, mostly because Tweek was going so fucking _slow_ , and also because I felt like I should somehow be returning the favor. I wanted to touch him, but the best I could do from the angle I had was brushing my fingers through his hair, and stroking his cheeks. So that’s what I did, feeling very affectionate, and he hummed appreciatively, pulling his mouth off of me long enough to say,

“Can I go faster now?”

I groaned, rolling my eyes. He was going slow because he thought I couldn’t handle it? It was sweet, but totally unnecessary. “Fuck, babe, go for it, that feels so fucking good.”

Tweek did his little giggle-laugh, and turned his attention back to my dick, gripping the base with one hand and taking fucking half it all at once. I had to fucking bite my lip not to jerk upwards again, and I guess Tweek was expecting something like my previous reaction, because he sunk his nails into my hip to keep me down. It stung a little, I guess, but I was a little distracted by several other external influences to worry about Tweek’s dull, bitten-down nails.

I was physically incapable of looking away from him. Like, I would probably explode if I looked away for even a second, because, as irrational as it was in the moment, all I could think about was how lucky I was.

I mean, how the fuck did an asshole like me get someone like Tweek? Adorable, coffee-guzzling Tweek, who didn’t _just_ put up with my shit, but gave me shit back. Who would swear in the middle of card games, and had the right hook from hell, and swooned the first time I called him babe, and would insult people quietly so that only I could hear him, and kissed me on the lips in front of everyone because he knew I wanted to, but also knew I was never going to.

And Tweek, who was apparently _really_ fucking good at blow jobs.

After I-don’t-know-how-fucking-long, I felt that edge coming. I could almost see it actually, and I guess Tweek took note, because he started bobbing his head faster, and jerking his hand along the rest of my dick that his mouth couldn’t reach.

“Tweek, Jesus; fuck, babe, that’s . . . yeah, like that, oh, _fuck_ . . .” I wasn’t even sure what I was saying, words were just sprinting out of my mouth, and I wasn’t really aware enough to stop them.

“Oh . . . _shit_ , I’m gonna . . .” Before I could finish my hazy, horny ramblings, I gripped Tweek’s hair, and pulled his head off of my dick. He seemed surprised, but I didn’t know if he was okay with me coming in his mouth, and I didn’t want to find out the hard way. I didn’t even know if he wanted me to come on his face, but my brain was very scattered, and it was the only thing I could think of doing. Besides, it was safer that way, and also really fucking hot to watch my come land on his face.

“Fuck, Tweek . . .” I moaned, my eyes squeezed shut tight.

Tweek shook his head, jostling my hands from his cheeks, and my entire body jolted when his lips wrapped around my dick again. He bobbed his head at a slower pace than before, which I appreciated. It felt good, to ride out my orgasm like that, like he was gently coaxing me back to reality. But he kept going, and, as nice as it originally was, it was starting to get unbearable.

And then, after, like five seconds, my muscles jumped and I hissed, “Okay, okay, stop.” I grabbed his cheeks and lifted his head again, his mouth making an audible pop noise. I let out deep breaths to calm my pumping heart and opened my eyes again. I was met with the beautiful sight of a plump-lipped Tweek, with wide, shining eyes, and my come all over his face. Beautiful, absolutely fucking beautiful.

Without thinking, I reached out and started to wipe away the come from his face with the palms of my hands. He flushed red, (well, redder than he had already been), at my touch; I tried to keep it as gentle and loving as possible, ignoring the x-rated reality of what I was actually wiping away.

When I was done, I wiped my hands on the sheets of the other mattress, the one we probably weren't going to be sleeping on. Tweek scrunched up his face, but I assured him with a smile, “I’ll wash the sheets tomorrow.” I pulled his face towards me, and gave him a kiss on the lips. Maybe I should’ve been grossed out, because I was kissing my own dick by proxy, but I was too caught up in the moment to really . . . care.

When I pulled back, and looked at him, I tried to figure out what to say, but I couldn't think of anything. I mean, there was a lot _to_ say, but none of it could really be translated into actual words. I had just reached my most vulnerable. It was pretty much impossible to get more vulnerable, unless I suddenly started to sob in front of him. There was so much I could’ve told him then, but the seriousness of the situation was kind of botched, because I couldn’t stop myself from smiling.

And, word-wise, all I could come up with was, “Uh, thanks.”

Tweek rolled his eyes, swatting my hands away. “That’s all you have to say?”

“Okay, fine,” I responded. “I revoke my thanks. That was fucking amazing, Tweek, where did you learn how to do that?” As soon as the words left my mouth, I grimaced. Because I wasn’t so sure I wanted him to answer. “Nevermind, I don’t wanna know.”

Tweek did his little giggle-laugh. “Shut up. It’s a gift I was born with, I guess.”

“Yeah, a gift,” I said, shifting my body closer to him. I reached towards him and placed my hand high up on his thigh, (I was about an _inch_ from his dick), and his face relaxed, his eyes fluttering shut, and he moaned softly. I glanced down, and saw that his dick was still standing firmly at attention, and I almost felt bad that I hadn’t gotten him off yet. And kind of selfish that I’d let him get me off first.

“Can you --” he started, his eyes still delicately closed.

I knew what he was about to ask, so I slowly slid my hand from his thigh up his stomach, and gently pushed on his chest, prompting to lay back. He let me move him pliantly, and his eyes opened again when I stretched myself out over top of him, hovering about an inch from his chest and stomach. I leaned down, and nuzzled our noses together, mumbling to him, “Your turn?”

Tweek moaned again. “Yes please -- _fuck_.”

I pecked him on his parted lips, and mimicked what he’d done to me, kissing my way towards his dick. And I was once again treated to Tweek’s very reactive response to me touching him; he was squirming and moaning and clutching at anything around him that was remotely tangile. Which basically meant the sheets, and my hair, and his hair. He was so vocal; just listening to him, I could distantly feel the pooling of heat just below my navel.

When I’d reached his cock, I did the same thing he did: I positioned it so it was upright, and I kissed the head. I was not very confident in what I was doing, and hoped that it was going to turn out as good for him as it did for me.

I guess my uneasiness showed in my face, because before I could go any further, Tweek grabbed a handful of my hair and clenched tightly, stopping me from putting my mouth on him again. I glanced up at him, and raised an eyebrow at the worried frown on his previously-dazed face. “What?”

Tweek fidgeted with my sheets, and shook his head at me. “You don’t have to, Craig."

'Kay. So, that was the _last_ thing I expected to come out of his mouth. “I know I don’t _have_ to, Tweek.”

“Ngh . . . it’s just you look so nervous, and you haven’t been out to yourself for nearly as long as I have, I don’t want you to suck my dick unless you really, really want to.”

I tried to hide my amused grin, but I wasn’t sure I was pulling it off. “So are you saying you _don’t_ want me to suck your dick?”

“GAH! Of course I _want_ you to --”

“Okay, great --”

“But that doesn’t mean that you _have_ to, I don’t want you to --”

“Are you gonna shut up now so I can suck your dick in peace?” I asked, giving his cock a few lazy strokes and staring up at him. Tweek shivered again, and moaned, and some of the awareness in his face faded. “Because you keep talking about me not sucking your dick, and it’s kind of getting in the way of me, you know. Actually sucking it. Whenever you’re ready, asshole.”

“Okay, okay, _fine_!” Tweek said, a flushed exasperation written all over his face. “You can -- _ngh_ \-- suck my dick.”

I snorted. Tweek made me sucking his dick sound like a privilege. I didn’t really see any point in responding, and instead turned my attention back to his dick. Tweek did this thing with his tongue, and I really, really liked it, so I tried copying it. I had no idea if I was doing it right, but the second my tongue made that marvelous trek across the head of his dick, Tweek gasped and moaned extra loudly.

I’m gonna be kind of gross for a second, hope you don’t mind. He didn't taste like salt, but there was definitely a salty quality there. I never really thought about what a dick would taste like, so I wasn’t entirely thrown off by it because I had no expectations to live up to or to not live up to, and Tweek’s reaction, a loud moaning breath, made my complete ignorance to the feeling entirely worth it. And, even though it originally felt a little strange, I liked it.

Fuck, I liked it a lot.

I tried to keep my teeth away from his dick as much as possible, and I kept my lips firm and closed around his dick. I’ll admit, having Tweek’s dick in my mouth was definitely more arousing than I was expecting it to be. I knew I was going to like it, because it was a dick, and I had recently come to terms with how very much I liked dick, but I didn’t realize how fucking hot it was gonna be, both literally and figuratively. Well, I say _figuratively_ , I just mean it was hot. You know. Sexy. I could feel myself getting hard again.

I had discovered that I had a bit of a thing for Tweek being happy. Tweek being happy made me happy, and the absolutely blissful, ecstatic look on his face was pleasing me almost as much as his dick in his mouth was.

Bobbing my head, I hollowed my cheeks, and was encouraged by Tweek’s endless supply of disoriented moaned words, and not much later, Tweek said, his voice breathless and laced with arousal, “ _Jesus_ , Craig, fuck, oh God, I’m gonna . . . gonna come --”

And then I had a decision to make: lift my head and get come all over my face, or swallow like a man. There were pros and cons to each side, and I weighed them quickly in my head as I quickened my pace, eager to watch Tweek’s orgasm play out on his face.

About half a second later, with a loud, “ _Oh, Craig!_ ”, I felt Tweek’s come shoot into my mouth.

Okay, I have another little confession. One of the cons of swallowing was that the taste was probably gonna be horrible, and I mean, it kind of was, but it didn’t really register as horrible. I knew it didn’t taste good, but I swallowed it anyway, and I slowed my speed, helping Tweek ride out his orgasm, like he had done for me.

Once Tweek had deflated and was just panting heavily, I pulled my mouth off of his dick and licked my lips, watching with half-lidded eyes as a lazy, contented smile crossed his flushed face. I smiled back at him, even though his eyes were closed and he couldn’t see me, and sat up. I stretched quickly, and then crawled over so that I was resting on my side next to him, my head hovering just over the pillow as I watched him return to our dorm room from somewhere else.

He blinked a few times, and looked over at me. I could actually see the awareness slowly fade back into his eyes. It was actually kind of amazing to watch, and then a huge smile suddenly broke out on his face, and, brushing his sweaty hair out of his face, he turned on his side to face me. With a laugh, he said, “ _Thank you, Craig_.”

I caught on immediately to what he was doing. That asshole was making fun of me. I gave him a fake-blank expression, even though it was extremely difficult to keep the smile off of my face. “Oh, _that’s_ what I get? I give you a blow job, and you _mock_ me?”

He did his little giggle-laugh and said, “Yep.”

My heart melted, and I actually almost ‘awww’ed out loud. “Some boyfriend you are.”

He giggled -- he seemed very giddy and that was something I could get used to: a Tweek that got extra giggly after he orgasmed -- and I wrapped an arm around him, pulling him firmly into my chest. We fell into a relaxed, comfortable silence. It was nice, I liked it. Warm. Homey. That word kept coming up when I thought about Tweek. He had a very ‘home’ feel to him. Like, being at my house in Middle Town was okay, it was where my family was and my bed was, but Tweek was where my _heart_ was.

Ugh, that sounds dumb.

Nevermind.

My chest was a little tight, so I tried to distract myself by nuzzling Tweek’s head down and placing a kiss on his forehead. “Are you okay?”

I asked because I was worried. Because, sure, we’d both made each other come already -- the day before we left for vacation -- but we had never been that intimate before. We’d both been completely naked, down to the basics, the way God or whatever intended us to be. It was nerve-wracking, in some sense of the word it was scary. Tweek and I were the same that way: we were very private people. (At least when it came to the really important shit.) And we had just shared one of the most bonding experiences that we possibly could have. (That didn’t include murder.) I figured it was a legitimate question.

Tweek let out a long sigh, but I could tell he wasn’t sad, or hurt, or anything. It was a happy sigh; even though it was just breath, I could clearly tell the difference.

“I’m okay.” Tweek lifted his head, putting it exactly next to mine on the pillow, and he observed me intently. “Are you okay?”

I grinned. “I’m awesome.”

Tweek did his little giggle-laugh, but didn’t say anything. He just stared at me, his wide hazel eyes boring into my fucking soul. God fucking dammit, those fucking eyes, Jesus it’s like they weren’t even real. They looked animated, but not like shitty animation like _some_ shows that I knew about, but high-quality CGI eyes. He shifted closer to me, resting his forehead against mine, and I basked in the light warm breaths that steadily kissed my mouth. It was comforting. Tweek’s eyes were comforting.

It made me think back to Cartman’s comment earlier in the night. That Tweek had ‘put me on a leash’ already. As much as I didn’t want that to be true, it was totally true. I really, really liked making him happy. Maybe that was just the effects of the ‘honeymoon phase’, or maybe that was just how our relationship was going to go. It didn’t really matter in that moment, because his hazel eyes were so warm and nice to look at, and I was sooo happy.

. . .

Jesus, Tweek really had made me into a little bitch.

After a couple minutes of content silence, I felt a yawn prick at my throat, and I succumbed to the fact that I was extremely exhausted. With a groan, I pulled away from him, standing up irritably and turned the lamp off. As I went to lay back down, I pulled one of our blankets that was acting as a canopy from the fort Tweek had made earlier in the day, and draped it over the two of us as I settled back down comfortably. I pulled Tweek back into my chest, prepared to just completely pass out.

"Goodnight, babe," I said, my eyes slipping closed slowly.

Tweek hummed happily and said, "'Night, Craig."

Maybe half a minute later, I was almost asleep, when I heard Tweek suddenly exclaim quietly,

“ _Oh, God_!”

I cracked an eye open. I could hardly see his face because of how dark the room was, although the moon was lightly some of his face, giving his normally pale skin a bluish tint. “What’s the matter, honey?”

He looked very distraught. “ _Jack_ ,” was all he said, his voice the epitome of trauma.

And it took a second for that to make sense, and for me to remember who ‘Jack’ was. And when I did, I was embarrassed, sure, but I was also very amused. The image of Jack’s poor roommate, who was either very straight or very gay, huddled in a corner, horrified, made my amusement swell. “He’ll get over it. Don’t worry, I’ll kick his ass if he mentions it again.” I gave Tweek a kiss on the nose. “Now. Go to sleep. I’m tired.”

Tweek let out a long breath, and nodded. “Ngh. . . yeah, okay. Love you.”

My eyes still felt very heavy, so I closed them. And my brain was fuzzy with exhaustion, which might've contributed to my delirious and goofy smile. Fuck, I forgot how awesome it was to hear him say that. "I love you, too."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please excuse my inexperience!
> 
> Also, please check out this wonderful artist who drew a PICTURE of Craig and Tweek's first meeting from my story! It's amazing, and the artist is amazing, and thank you guys so much!
> 
> https://aminoapps.com/c/south-park/page/blog/the-roommate/NaeV_K5fMu318xBkVwRY1D8bMnQmqj0YVG


	25. Don't Leave Me For An Alien

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got an ask yesterday from my tumblr, (theyregonnagetme), asking if this story was mine, and, because I've never gotten an ask that I've had an answer to before, I panicked, and I'm pretty sure I just sent "j" without any explanation, but I just wanted to clarify that that IS my tumblr and this IS my story! 
> 
> Thank you for the support, and seriously, if you want, come yell nonsense at me on tumblr!

I woke up the next morning way too fucking early. The sun wasn’t even all the way up yet, the orange sky persisted through the shadeless and curtainless window. And it wasn’t even like a slow ascent into consciousness. It was like one moment my eyes were closed, and the next they were open. Which sounds dumb, but whatever.

The first thing I noticed was how close I was to the floor. It was disorienting, like when you’re sleeping on a mattress but you’re, you know. Too close to the floor. It’s like driving in a small car, and then looking up at a giant truck.

And then the second thing I noticed was a broiling heat next to me. I glanced over, my eyes obnoxiously sharp for the time of day, and was met with the wide open eyes of Tweek. We weren’t cuddling; the only parts of us that were touching were our arms, and it was only the result of how small the mattress was-- week seemed to have subconsciously stayed away from the soiled mattress, meaning we were scrunched up on one. Not that that was a problem.

Tweek grinned at me. “Good morning.”

I smiled back at him, and gestured him to me with a lazy arm. “‘Morning, babe.”

Tweek rolled over onto his side, wrapping an arm around my waist, and curling one of his legs around mine. He rested his head on my upper arm and looked up at me.

“How long have you been up?” I asked, bringing an arm around him.

“A half hour?” he said. “I think it was a half hour.”

“What’ve you been doing this whole time?” I asked.

Tweek was quiet for a few seconds, tilting his head down so that I could barely see his face. “Nothing.”

Because _that_ wasn’t suspicious. “Honey, what were you doing?” I asked in a half sing-song voice.

He groaned, pressing his face in my chest. “So I was watching you sleep, fuck you, man! Grr . . . you look hot when you’re sleeping!”

I’d like to think I had gotten better at accepting his flirtations, even if they were reluctant. But I totally hadn’t, and could feel my cheeks heating up as I answered, “You look hot when you sleep, too.”

Tweek growled, obviously embarrassed. “Shut up, man!”

I chuckled, but listened, and we rested into a comfortable silence.

Maybe five minutes later, I remembered that my come was still all over the sheet on the mattress next to ours. And I couldn’t just not clean it up; I was arguably obsessive about my laundry, so I gently shooed Tweek away from me and sat up.

“I have to go wash those sheets,” I said, stretching up and scratching the back of my head. “They’re still all gross from last night.” When I stood up, brushing off the blanket that was around my hips, I felt an unexpected chill run up my body. “Fuck, I completely forgot I was naked,” I said to him, immediately moving towards my backpack to put some clothes on.

Tweek snorted, moving to his side of the room and pulling a pair of olive green boxers from his duffle bag. “NGH! I didn’t,” he said, pulling them up over his hips and snapping the elastic on his skin.

I glanced at him over my shoulder, rolling my eyes just so he could see. “Pervert.”

He giggled but didn’t say anything. He turned towards his duffle bag, pulling out clean clothes and placing them on the skeleton of his bed.

I leaned up against the wall, folding my arms over my chest, and watched him get dressed through half-lidded eyes. He started with his pants, stepping into them carefully and yanking them up jerkily. He stumbled, but caught himself, letting out one of those screeching sounds that I’d come to associate with him. He buttoned and zipped his jeans quickly, and then picked up his shirt. I was actually really curious about this bit, because I could never really fathom how he always fucked up buttoning his shirt. Like. You would think he’d learn at some point, after all those years of wearing button-ups, but nope. His fingers scrambled at the buttons, and I could see, even though he was only half-facing me, as he grabbed at the wrong button when he shifted to the next hole. And then he missed another button moving up, and it was all kinds of screwed up. But again, I decided not to say anything. It was one of those endearing Tweek things that I couldn’t bear to change.

When Tweek was finished, he turned around again, and jolted when we made eye contact. I don’t think he knew I was watching him, which I found incredibly amusing.

“GAH! _Craig_! Did you just--”

“Ogle you while you got dressed?” I smirked. “Yep.”

“NGH! _Why_ , man? I don’t want you--”

“Honey, we were just naked,” I said with a chuckle.

“Well, _yeah_ , but--”

I rolled my eyes, reaching behind me and quickly pulling a NASA t-shirt over my head. “You’re not going to win, babe, just accept it.”

With a huff, Tweek turned away and walking over to his coffee maker. His cheeks were pink, but there was a slight upturn to his lips on one side, which told me he wasn’t mad. Just trying to be mad, which was somehow even more adorable than him when he was actually mad.

I heaved my mattress onto my bed, getting my side of the room all situated, before I walked over to the mattress still on the floor. I ripped off the sheets, and bunched it in a pile with our clothes from the day before. Slipping my key into my pocket and grabbing a thing of laundry detergent from underneath my bed, I gathered everything in my arms and said to him, “I’ll be back in a little bit.”

“GAH! Okay,” he answered, turning towards his coffee maker with his lime green coffee mug in his hands.

* * *

Thank fucking God there was nobody in the laundry room that morning. Although, I wouldn’t really expect anyone to be, because classes hadn’t even started yet, and I couldn’t imagine anyone having to wash anything. Just sex-starved gays like Tweek and I.

I set a timer on my phone for when the laundry was supposed to be finished, because I didn’t want to hang around in the laundry room when I could not do that, and hang out with Tweek upstairs.

And by the time I had made it back up to our dorm room, I was actually kind of surprised to see Tweek’s head tilted all way back, an indication that he had just downed whatever was left of his coffee. Pretty impressive, I was only gone for like five minutes.

Before he could hop to his feet from his sheetless bed, I asked impulsively from the doorway, “Can I make you coffee?”

It was a thought that hadn’t really been resting in my mind for any period of time, and I surprised myself by saying it. But after I _had_ said it, I couldn’t believe I hadn’t thought of it before, because it sounded like something I’d jump all over doing. It was one of those subtle things, like kissing him on the forehead or brushing my fingers through his hair or stroking the back of his hand with my thumb. I was all for little I-care-about-yous, because it was easier and less awkward for me than saying anything like that out loud.

Tweek’s eye twitched as he stood up. “GAH! What? Why?”

I shrugged, closing the door  behind me and walking to his coffee maker. I observed it thoughtfully, saying to him, “Because I want to.”

He stared at me for a few seconds, like he was trying to figure out if I had an angle, but I guess he saw the lack of malicious intent as I stared right back at him because he nodded. “Sure, man. Do you know how?”

I rolled my eyes. “I think I can figure it out.”

Jump thirty seconds into the future and:

“Jesus, Craig, it’s a single serve coffee machine, it isn’t _that_ hard!”

I glanced up from the open lid of the coffee maker and frowned at Tweek. He was watching me with an amused yet exasperated smile, that fucking asshole. “I have tried my best not to even look at a coffee maker since I was thirteen, honey, let alone touch it to make anything.”

Tweek rolled his eyes, and hopped to his feet. I could feel the judgement in his body language, and it was starting to low key piss me off. “You just stick the thing inside of the thing, close it, and press the middle button.”

I dropped my shoulders and gave him a deadpanned look. “Fucking really, Tweek? How the fuck am I supposed to know what you’re talking about?”

He just shook his head, this small smirk on his face as he used his hip to push me away from his coffee maker. He kept his eyes fixed to me--lids lowered in his amusement--and he very deliberately plucked the little plastic cup thing out of my hands and set it on the table. I was trying to stay irritated, but he looked so adorable acting all smug.

“The thing,” he said, lifting the little plastic cup thing, “And you put it in the thing,”  he placed the cup in this little hole in the lid, “And you close it,” he closed it, “And you press the middle button.” and then he pressed the middle button.

Dark liquid started trickling down into Tweek’s line green mug, and Tweek pivoted so that he was facing me entirely, and he smiled up at me. “GAH! Coffee,” he announced.

“Fantastic,” I said flatly.

And then when the coffee maker trickled to a stop, and his mug was filled, he wrapped his fingers around it and brought it to his mouth, taking a long inhale. Breathing his coffee. It was one of those I had started picking up on what seemed like years ago, and now I couldn’t stop noticing it.

While he was situating himself on his bed, I went over to my bedside table and opened a box of granola bars, pulling two out, one for me and one for him. I joined him on his bed, handed him one, and we fell into another easy silence.

Again, it was broken by Tweek’s motor mouth. “You know what we haven’t done before?”

I crumpled the granola bar wrapped in one fist and looked over at him. “What?”

“Gone out for breakfast. Just the two of us.”

“That’s because we both hate mornings.” I quirked my lips. “Why the hell are we awake, anyway?”

Tweek made this sound at the back of his throat that was kind of like a groan, kind of like a snort. A sound that he made a lot when he was thinking. “We went to sleep like three hours before we’re used to, that’s why.”

“Remind me to never let that happen again.”

“GAH! Noted.”

“So why are you bringing that up?” I asked.

“We’ve never--NGH!--gone on a date before,” he said. “Not an _actual_ one anyway. But just so you know, I consider that time we went to Applebee's, when we met Nikiel, to be our first date, and you can’t change my mind.”

I tilted my head in thought. That made sense. It was weirdly date-like for just two friends. Maybe not for two _normal_ best friends, but I never would’ve acted like that with anybody other than Tweek, so I decided to go with what Tweek said. For someone who never made sense, he often made sense. “I agree with that. So did you want to go today?”

“Nothing like the present, man.” Another weirdly worded metaphor. English really wasn’t his forte. “Besides, a breakfast date is perfect,” he added. “I won’t get weird looks for ordering coffee.”

I chuckled. “Okay. Once the laundry’s done, we can leave.”

* * *

Tweek and I had just left our dorm room, and I’m talking _just_ left, when we heard a familiar,

“Hey, guys.”

Tweek and I stopped walking, and I glanced over my shoulder. It was Jack. And he was standing maybe five feet away in what I will now refer to as the Jack Lean, where he was just casually leaning up against absolutely nothing, his arms folded over his chest, and a cool, relaxed expression.

“Hey.”

“GAH!”

“How’s it going? You’re up early, I’ve never seen you out at nine a.m. on a weekend before. Did you finally realize there’s a rat problem in our building?”

Tweek immediately reacted to that, his free hand flying up to his hair as he stared up at me. “GAH! EHH! _Rat problem?_ _What_ rat problem?”

“You guys haven’t heard the scratching in the walls?” he asked, raising a casual eyebrow.

I stroked the back of Tweek’s hand when he started trembling more than he had been before. I didn’t realize he was scared of rats. It was a fact about Tweek that I made of point of storing in the back of my mind. “I think you’re hearing things, dude.”

He shrugged. “Maybe. Or you two are deaf.”

“Or you’re hearing things.”

He shrugged again. “Maybe. So can I walk with you guys?”

Tweek and I exchanged questioning glances, both at the request and at the sudden conversation change. I mean, I didn’t care, and Tweek’s indifferent little mouth quirk and eye twitch told me _he_ didn’t care, (despite the fact that Jack had just scared him), so I said to Jack, “If you want to.”

“Cool,” Jack said, walking in sync with Tweek and I. “And hey, so _apparently_ you guys didn’t listen to a word I said yesterday.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, I overheard your little _exploits_ last night. Tweek, especially.”

With a terrified gasp, Tweek screeched, “ _How do you know my name!_ ” He trembled into himself and stared up at me like _I_ had the answers, but really, I had no fucking idea. We had never introduced ourselves before.

“Because Craig’s little ‘ _fuck, Tweek_ ’ at the end there was _way_ louder than I’m sure you thought it was,” Jack said, chuckling.

Tweek groaned, and smacked his forehead on my shoulder. “ _Jesus Christ!_ ” he exclaimed awkwardly. “It’s not _our_ fault the walls are thin!”

“No,” Jack said thoughtfully. “But it’s really funny.”

“What’d your roommate do?” I asked, trying to move the topic of conversation slightly away from the actual events of the night. Besides, I found his his roommate’s awkwardness amusing.

“My roommate transferred,” Jack said with a shrug.

“Oh.” Personally, I wanted that to be the end of that conversation, but Jack started fucking _talking_ about.

“Yeah, I talked to the lady at the admissions office, and she said she wasn’t technically allowed to give out information about other students, but I’m a charming guy, and I managed to get her to talk. She said he moved to some Catholic school in North Carolina, and that’s all she knew. I feel kind of bad for him, because the more I think about it, the more I’m pretty positive he was gay. He was just so attached to his closet that he felt the need to transfer to a Catholic school just to stay in there. As a gay myself, I feel for him, I really do. But he was also just . . . he was really weird. He talked in his sleep a lot, and about a month into the semester, I heard him talk about his cockroach collection. I mean, not that there’s anything . . . _wrong_ with having a cockroach collection, but he was weirdly obsessed with them. He named one Lucy. And he was really awkward around anything sex-related. I asked if he had a girlfriend, or a boyfriend, because, I mean, you can never be too sure. He didn’t even answer me, he just put his headphones in and turned his music up loud. He ignored me for the rest of the day.”

There was a lull in Jack’s constant talking, so I squeezed in, “That’s very interesting. Thank you for sharing.”

“Is he always this sarcastic?” Jack asked Tweek with a chuckle.

“GAH! Yeah, he’s a dick,” Tweek said, nodding jerkily.

I flicked his forehead, ignoring his adorable, surprised squeal. “That is something that you probably shouldn’t disclose to strangers, honey.”

Jack jumped on my comment immediately. “First of all, that was absolutely adorable, I didn’t take you for the pet name type, but I am absolutely delighted. And second, we’re not strangers! I finally, in . . . fuck, nineteen years, have some gay friends.”

“Are we really friends though?” I asked, raising an eyebrow. As far as I was concerned, Jack and I weren’t friends. I didn’t make friends that easily, because we had never done any ‘friend related’ things. We’d had two conversations in two days, and the majority of those conversations consisted of Jack oversharing. I’ll admit, he did me a solid by inadvertently diverting Clyde and Token, but I barely knew him. All I did know about him was his name, his sexual orientation, and his thoughts regarding his weird-ass ex-roommate.

I felt a punch on my right shoulder, a sure sign that Tweek didn’t particularly like my comment. “EHH! Craig, that’s mean!”

But Jack didn’t seem all that offended. “No, I get it! You don’t make friends easy, but that’s okay, because I do.”

“Then how come you keep talking about how lonely you are?” I asked.

Jack shrugged. “Because I _am_ lonely. I make friends easy, but they always leave me eventually. And besides, self-deprecating humor is popular right now, right?”

I stared at him out of the corner of my eye. “I guess.”

There was a beat of blessed silence, which was inevitably broken by Jack’s mouth. “So where are you guys going?”

“Breakfast date,” Tweek said simply, probably to stop any possible rude remarks from me.

“Aww,” Jack said with a chuckled. “That’s so cute. Well, I’ll leave you guys alone. Nothing worse than a third wheel.”

Well, yeah. And I’ll admit, his company wasn’t horrible, but it got old very quickly, and I was ready to just be alone with Tweek. 

Before Jack could take a step away from us, we ran into guess the fuck who. The Asshole Quartet, Clyde, Token, Bebe, and Wendy. Of fucking course. I couldn’t have a single day without them suddenly showing up. It was like there was a magnetic pull between us, like all South Park citizens found each other by some great, unexplainable force of nature. Maybe I should quit my dreams of being an astrophysicist and focus on studying that, instead.

There was an almost standoffish silence for an unprecedented amount of time before Cartman said, raising an eyebrow in Jack’s direction, “Who’s the asshole?”

Jack quirked his lips up in his half-grin and held out a hand for Cartman to shake. “I’m Jack.”

Cartman scrunched up his nose and looked Jack up and down. “Mhmm,” was all he said, keeping his hands firmly away from any part of Jack.

Jack took the hint and lowered his hand. He looked over at me, and asked with his eyes, “Who are they?”

I shrugged. “That’s --”

But before I could even finished my sentence, Clyde clicked his tongue and frowned. “Wait, _I_ know you. You told me and Token that Craig wasn’t in his dormroom, when he actually _was_ in his dorm room, getting totally shitfaced and probably crying!”

I felt a sudden surge of anger crinkling in my chest. “ _Clyde_ ,” I spat, narrowing my eyes at him. Only a few select people even knew about that whole thing, and I wanted to keep it that way. “Fuck you, can you not?”

“O-ho-ho,” Cartman said, a grin crossing his face. And that right there was why I didn’t want anybody else knowing. I wasn’t exactly known for being emotional, and I was so fucking proud of that. It was a sensitive topic, anyway, and I didn’t feel like being ripped on about it. “I'm sorry, back up--what’s this about Craig _crying_?”

But I guess Clyde was too irritated to acknowledge him. “Well, I’m not gonna fucking sugar coat it,” Clyde said, folding his arms over his chest, a scowl on his face. “I’ve decided I hate you,” he added, turning his attention to Jack.

Jack frowned deeply. “I didn’t think he _was_ in there! Nobody had come in or out the entire weekend. And I _definitely_ didn’t know he was drunk. I would’ve helped him if I knew he was.” It sounded like it could’ve been a lie, but I knew, from what little I did know of him, that he probably would’ve helped me. He seemed like the type.

“Irregardless,” Clyde spat. “I hate you on principle.”

Jack sighed, his posture slouching. He looked so fucking disappointed, and I thought back to what he had just said to Tweek and I moments before: _I make friends easy, but they always leave me eventually_. Clyde’s abrupt and almost violent hatred of him must’ve been a harsh blow, and I actually felt. Ugh. _Bad_.

“It’s not his fault.” “It’s--GAH!--not his fault!”

I blinked, and looked at Tweek. We had never talked at the same time before, and it was a little unnerving, but the confused look that I was met with was really fucking cute, so I wasn’t too bothered by it.

“Thanks, guys!” Jack said, and when I looked over, his posture had straightened again, that half-grin spreading across his face.

I didn’t answer him, and Tweek just “GAH!”’d, which was about what I expected.

Clyde didn’t look too convinced, but he didn’t say anything else, which was a gift to everyone around him.

“So where are you guys going?” Token asked. I knew the underlying question, though. He was essentially asking why Tweek and I were hanging out with some other guy, when he knew that I didn’t like anybody, and Tweek was weird around strangers.

“Tweek and I were going out for breakfast,” I said. “Jack was about to fuck off, and you’re about to too.” And, because I was sick of being around people that felt the need to actually talk to me, I tugged on Tweek’s hand and led him down the sidewalk, away from those assholes.

“Bye! Don’t forget to use protection!” Kenny called with a chuckle.

I rolled my eyes, not even bothering to acknowledge him. Why the fuck would he even say that? It was like ten in the morning, and we were leaving our dorm room, why the fuck would we need to use protection? I was too hungry to think about sex.

Tweek and I had been walking aimlessly for maybe five minutes, before Tweek said, “Uh . . . GAH! Where are we going?”

“We’re going out for breakfast.”

“NGH! No shit, I mean _where_?”

I tilted my head thoughtfully. “How about we just go to the first restaurant we walk by?” I settled on after a moments contemplation.

“Okay,” Tweek agreed, taking a side step towards me so that our shoulders bumped.

* * *

 Turns out the first restaurant that Tweek and I past was this dinky little diner that had about three booths, and five tables, and one waitress. We were seated as soon as we walked in the doors, (just an absent-minded call from the hostess, “Go find a seat, and Brenda will be with you shortly,”).

The entire restaurant was empty. Which was probably a blessing and a curse. On the one hand, you don’t have to deal with other humans, but on the other hand, the wait staff don’t get paid much hourly, and a lot of the time they rely on tips. Which is a pretty sad thought, and it made me think to tip the apathetic-looking waitress very nicely.

The second Tweek and I sat down, facing each other, he announced, “NGH! _I’m_ paying.”

I raised an eyebrow. He sounded way too determined for what he was actually saying. “Are you sure?”

He frowned. “ _Yes_ , I’m sure! You do so much for me, I want to do something for you, too.”

I kind of got the sense that he wanted me to just roll with it, so I just rolled with it. I _preferred_ paying, just because I liked being in control of shit like that, but he looked very firm, so I let him have it. I did feel bad, though, having him pay for me, so I decided I’d order something small whenever Brenda the Waitress came.

And as soon as I came to that conclusion, a woman wearing a navy blue polo shirt with a black apron approached our table. “Good morning, my name is Brenda, I’ll be your server.” She spoke in a flat voice, like she didn’t want to be working. I couldn’t care less what she sounded like. I would hate to work on a Sunday morning, too. “Can I start you two off with some drinks?”

“I’ll just have some water,” I said, glancing up at her.

Tweek cleared his throat shakily and, when I looked at him, he gave me a weird questioning look. I’d mentioned to him at some point that I liked to drink orange juice with pretty much every meal, so it must’ve looked suspicious that I was just getting water. He just shook his head, though, and looked up at Brenda out of the corner of his eye. “Uh . . . can I have some coffee? GAH! Please?” he asked.

With a completely expressionless face, Brenda nodded and said, “I’ll be right back with those.” She walked away, tucking her hands up until her knuckles into the small pocket of her apron.

“GAH! She’s like you!” Tweek exclaimed. I’m pretty sure it was loud enough for Brenda to hear, but Tweek either didn’t care, or didn’t realize it.

“How is she like me?” I asked.

“If you worked as a waiter, then that is exactly how you would act, man! Horrible with the customers, and honestly doesn’t care if you get fired!”

I tilted my lips downwards in thought. What an excellent character assessment. Because, under Brenda's circumstances, I honestly couldn't see myself caring about keeping a wait staff job. Because first of all, I would make a terrible waiter, and second of all,  I didn't have the energy in the morning, so my terrible customer service attitude would be exponentially worse those days. I would be fired in a heart beat.

 

Brenda came back maybe a minute later, and she placed an empty mug in front of Tweek, and then poured some for him absently. And she did a nice fucking job, too. Almost as good as Nikiel.

“Do you need any creamer?” she asked flatly.

Tweek shook his head, and wrapped his hands around the steaming mug of coffee, a content look on his face.

Brenda looked at him for a few seconds, but didn’t comment on the fact that he could’ve potentially burned himself had he not been conditioned to withstand such high temperatures.

She took like three steps away from us, and put the coffee pot on a burner at this drink station thing. She grabbed a prepared glass of water and walked over, setting that in front of me, and, as soon as we were all situated, she pulled a little notepad from her pocket, flipped it open and said, not even looking at us, “Decided on anything?”

“I’ll just have some scrambled eggs,” I said, closing my menu and placing it at the end of the table so it was easier for the waitress to pick up. It was the cheapest item on the menu that would also convince someone that I was just barely hungry enough to order something.

“GAH! No he won’t!” Tweek spoke up, his voice shaky, loud, and irritated. I guess he caught onto my little plan. “He’ll have three blueberry pancakes with a side of scrambled eggs and bacon, because he needs to eat, _even_ if _I’m_ paying.”

I sat back in my seat, rolling my eyes and folding my arms over my chest. He was cute when he was irritated.

But I guess the waitress didn’t think so, because she looked extremely weirded out as she wrote down my order. “Uh. Okay? And what can I get for you?”

Tweek didn’t look away from me, that narrowed-eyed glare on his face as he said, “I’ll have two waffles with an egg over-easy and a side of sausage, because even though _I’m_ paying, I’m really hungry and I want a full breakfast.”

Brenda let out a soft breath, scrawling the order onto the little pad thing. Tweek wasn’t really capable of not being weird in public, and I was sure he’d be embarrassed later, but it wasn’t showing then.

The waitress collected the menus, tucking them under her arm, and said, “I’ll put those in for you.” She turned away immediately, shaking her head, and it was only then that Tweek snapped out of it, because he blinked a few times, and then called to her receding back,

“Oh--thank you!”

I snorted, leaning forward again and resting my forearms on the table. “Smooth, Tweek.”

He looked over at me, and renewed that half-lidded glare. “Just so you know, you’re an _asshole_. You don’t have to starve yourself because you don’t want to make me spend more money! That’s an _asshole_ thing to do, and I don’t care if you had good intentions. I wanna do something--ACK!-- _nice_ for you, okay? I feel like I never get to!”

I smiled at him, and patted his hand on the table gently. “Okay, fine. I’m sorry.”

Tweek grumbled, wrapping the fingers of his free hand around his steaming mug of coffee irritably. “ _Good_.”

 

About fifteen minutes later, Brenda returned with all of our food balanced in her hands and arms. Fucking wait staff, dude, I’ll never fucking understand. She sat everything down in front of us, straightened up, and said, “Anything else?”

I looked to Tweek, but he just shook his head, so I turned back to Brenda and said, “No.”

And then, with an _I only get paid $4 an hour so I am not obligated to give even half a fuck_ attitude, she walked away. I mean, even though she was kind of a terrible waitress, (or at least was terrible with people), I kind of liked her. I respected her disdain for everyone, so I wasn’t even mad that she was being a dick.

I turned back to Tweek and asked him, “So. I’ve been wondering for awhile now. How many cups of coffee can you carry at the same time?” It was a thought that been noodling around in my mind for a long time, and I’d finally had a chance to ask.

Tweek snorted. “A lot, man. I worked at a coffee shop, remember? I had to wait tables sometimes.”

“How many _have_ you carried at the same time?” I asked. I liked hearing about his coffee shop days. Just imagining Tweek wearing an apron and carrying around cups of coffee and rambling out the items on a menu in a shaky voice to customers always made my heart stutter just a little bit. And _that_ dated back to the third day I knew him, which served as a testament to how long he’d crowded my thoughts.

Tweek quirked his lips in thought. “Uh . . . five, I think.”

My eyes widened. I was expecting, like, three tops, because I couldn’t imagine where he could possibly fit put more without spilling it all the second he took a step. “Jesus, how’d you do that?”

He sighed. “I was twelve, and my parents were on vacation, so I had to run the coffee shop by myself. The store gets, _ngh_ , really busy on Sundays, because of all the church services, and there were just too many people in there. I got a lot of tips that day, though. I remember, I counted it all out, it was like ninety bucks, man.”

I decided not to comment on the fact that Tweek’s parents took a vacation without him. “Please tell me you kept it all.”

It wasn’t said in words, but I implied heavily that his parents were assholes enough to confiscate Tweek’s tips. It honestly wouldn’t surprise me at all. But I was soothed some when Tweek snorted. “Mom and Dad never took my tips. They would _ask_ for my tips, but I only gave them maybe five dollars and kept the rest.”

I let out a groan, and turned my attention to my breakfast, cutting up my pancakes into small pieces. Tweek didn’t like it when I voiced how much I hated his parents, so I’d been trying to keep it to myself, which meant I had to focus on something else entirely in the attempt to distract myself.

“I’ve never told anybody that before,” Tweek said thoughtfully. “I tell you things that I never thought I’d ever tell anyone.”

I sighed, and looked up at him again. He didn’t look too affected by his admission, so I took a second to calm myself down. I was _way_ more protective over him than he was protective of himself, and I didn’t like that thought, so I decided not to think it.

“I’m happy you trust me, Tweek,” was all I said.

“GAH! I’m happy I _can_ trust you,” he said back. “And, uh. You know, maybe this is a weird time to bring this up, but I’ve been thinking about it for awhile now.”

I put a piece of pancake in my mouth and looked up at him. Covering my mouth with my fist, I said, “What’s that?”

He sawed his fork into his egg and the yolk oozed all over his plate. “Well. Okay, so when I first met you, I was absolutely terrified of you, because you’re a terrifying person.”

I knew that I was somewhat intimidating if I tried to be, but I didn’t really want to scare Tweek when I first met him. That made me feel kind of weird, actually, but I let him continue with whatever he was saying.

“But then I got to know you, and you’re actually just a huge teddy bear.”

I grimaced. I didn’t want to be terrifying, but that didn’t mean I wanted to be a fucking teddy bear. “Fuck you, I’m not a teddy bear.”

Tweek did his little giggle-laugh. “Yes you are, man! You call me babe and honey and you like to cuddle --”

“Okay, _seriously_ , fuck you,” I said, my cheeks turning red, and, even though I knew nobody was paying attention to us, I slouched down in my seat. “I don’t like it when you draw attention to it.”

“Well _I_ think it’s cute. But that’s not my point anyway,” he said, swirling a cut-up piece of his waffle into a lake of maple syrup. “I just mean that the most terrifying person I’d ever met ended up being the first person.”

I raised an eyebrow. What the fuck did ‘first person’ mean? “What do you mean?”

“I mean--NGH! -- you were my first friend, my first kiss, my first date, my first boyfriend. First all of it, man.” He shook his head, in what it appeared to be disbelief. “That’s weird, right? I mean, that’s not normal, is it?”

“You’re not normal,” I said, smiling at the disgruntled expression I received in response. “But seriously, it’s fine. I feel honored, actually.” I was about half a second away from telling him that he was my first everything too, when I remembered something.

He wasn’t. I mean, he was my first relationship, my first dick-suck, and would eventually be my first fuck-fuck. But he wasn’t my first kiss.

Fucking _Nikiel_ was.  

And just remembering that made a pulse of guilt shoot through my heart, because, in some fucked up way, I felt like I betrayed him. I always preached that ‘Tucker’s didn’t do casual’, and ‘Tuckers find someone and stick with them for the rest of their lives’, but . . . that wasn’t entirely true in my case. Even though I hadn’t reciprocated, my lips weren’t exactly virgins when they finally made it to Tweek’s.

Tweek and I fell into a one-sided companionable silence. Tweek seemed content, but I was stressing the fuck out on the inside. Because I realized that maybe I should tell him that. It wasn’t really that big of a deal, and I guess it wasn’t protocol for most relationships, but Tweek and my relationship wasn’t exactly normal. Well, I mean it was normal, and it was probably healthier than any relationship that ever existed in South Park, but we were very much unexperienced when we first got together. _Very_ much so. So much so that not being my first kiss was something that . . . I don’t know, I felt like I should tell Tweek. I couldn’t explain why, but I just knew I should. And, like everything else I’d ever told him, I knew that if he found out later from someone other than me, it wouldn’t end well. Me, spending so much time around just Nikiel, even if it was before him and I had gotten together, would’ve probably stirred that age-old jealousy that Tweek had felt towards Nikiel for the longest time. And I didn’t want that, I still wanted them to get along, as much as I wanted Tweek to get along with my South Park friends.

“Tweek, I have to tell you something,” I blurted out without thinking. I realized a moment later that maybe I should’ve saved the conversation for a more private setting, but I guess I just hoped that the peaceful atmosphere would be enough to stop him from freaking out too much, because there was a . . . just a _chance_ that that would happen. Especially considering who the conversation was about.

He swallowed a mouthful of coffee and, glancing up at me, said, “What?”

“It’s not even really a big deal, actually,” I said.

“M’kay, so what is it?”

I hesitated, dragging a cut up piece of pancake through a pool of maple syrup. “I, uh . . . well, you weren’t my first kiss.”

Tweek didn’t look too bothered. He snorted and looked up at me, amused. “I didn’t think I was. You’re hot, and you were too good at it.”

I let out a breath. “Yeah, but I didn’t get my first kiss until I was already here, at college.” There it was, the bandaid was officially ripped the fuck off.

And those words definitely caught Tweek’s attention. He slowly put his mug of coffee back on the table, and narrowed his eyes at me. I could see the cogs moving in his head, and I hoped to fucking God he wasn’t going to be pissed at me. I was ready to use my ‘but I’m in love with you’ response, because I knew that that would work.

“Okay . . . who was it?” he asked slowly, leaning back in his seat and folding his arms over his chest.

“You don’t have to be mad.”

“You telling me that doesn’t really make me not want to be mad,” he said stiffly. “Who was it?”

I averted my eyes. There was that unreasonable guilt again. Because it wasn’t like I cheated on him, but it somehow felt like I had. “It was, uh . . . well, hey, so, Tweek, do you remember Nikiel?”

There was a long pause, in which I anxiously waited for a response.

“I have two questions,” was all he said.

I glanced up and saw a completely blank-faced Tweek. If not for a burning anger in his eyes and his red cheeks, his relaxed expression would’ve seemed serene, and not completely furious. “Okay.”

“When?”

“The first time I went to his apartment, right before we got shitfaced.”

He cleared his throat after another pause. “Okay, so maybe I have three questions. Was it anymore than a kiss?”

“No,” I said immediately. “Gross.”

Tweek let out a breath. “Okay. Okay, well that’s good.”

When he didn’t add onto that, I hesitated briefly before asking, “What’s your third question?”

He swallowed visibly. “Were you two like . . . did you guys--GAH!--date, or-or _whatever_ , I don’t know!”

Tweek wasn’t looking at me, but I smiled -- or tried to anyway -- at him, and, with great risk on my part, reached across the table and held his hand. He didn’t push me away, so I said confidently, “Absolutely not. I can’t even think about dating someone other than you. You’re _amazing_.”

I could tell Tweek was trying not to smile, but he was failing completely. His cheeks were pink, his eyes softening, and the corners of his mouth were tilting upwards. He averted his eyes, stifling a laugh behind his free hand. “NGH! O-oh.”

I chuckled, feeling myself go a little half-lidded. “It was a misunderstanding, honey. He thought something, and I thought something else, and he kissed me. That was it. I totally forgot about it until right now.”

“GAH! Good,” Tweek said, squeezing my hand and turning back to his coffee. “But seriously, Craig,” he added, catching my eye. “When we’re finished eating, you’re taking me to Nikiel’s apartment.”

I raised an eyebrow, confused. That was an unexpected request, but not so outlandish that I was going to argue against. “Um. Okay? Why?”

“Just . . . GAH!--there are some _things_ I want to make sure he understands.”

So _that_ sounded concerning, but I decided to roll with it. It was impossible to hate Nikiel, he was just one of those people. And especially with me as a mediator, I was sure nothing bad would happen. Tweek was unreasonable a lot of the time, but he was understanding and compassionate, and the second he saw that Nikiel was just a desperate guy who misread a situation, (like, _totally_ misread a situation), he would lose all his anger.

“Okay, honey,” I agreed with a nod.

* * *

Tweek paid, like he’d stated probably a thousand times, and then immediately stood up, coming around the table and pulling me to my feet. “GAH! Nikiel’s apartment,” he reminded emphatically, curling our fingers together and tugging me through the restaurant and to the front doors.

I followed after him. He was walking very fast, a stubborn expression on his face, and I knew better than to try to argue with him. He had his mind made up. He was . . . protective.

I mean, really I just found it incredibly adorable, but he probably would’ve punched my shoulder if I’d told him that, so I kept my mouth shut, and instead just stared at his profile, trying to brush away the smile from my face.

* * *

Tweek knocked on Nikiel’s door like five times, his shaking fists pounding loudly. There was a long stretch of nothing, and Tweek was lifting his hand to knock again, when the door opened and Tweek and I were met with Nikiel’s smiling face.

“Hey, Craig!” and, when he caught sound of Tweek, his eyes slid over to him, too. His smile didn’t fall for a second as he said, “And Tweek! What are you two doing here?”

“ _Hi_ , Nikiel,” Tweek greeted fiercely, stepping in front of me. “I just wanted to stop by and _remind_ you that Craig’s _my_ boyfriend! _I_ love him, and he loves me, and nobody, and I mean _nobody_ , is going to stand in the way of that!”

As scared as I’m sure Tweek wanted Nikiel to be, he didn’t seem very affected if his laughter said anything. “You got it, Tweek,” he said happily. “I’m just glad you two found each other, it sucked being on the outside of that whole shitshow, you know?”

I watched, mostly in amusement, as Tweek let out a calming breath. I don’t know what he expected when we went there; I don’t know if he was expecting a fight, or if he thought Nikiel was going to get scared and _avoid_ Tweek and I. So he seemed a little thrown off-guard by Nikiel’s placid response.

“Oh,” was all he said, squeezing my hand and shuffling his feet awkwardly.

“Any reason that’s coming up?” Nikiel asked, leaning against his door frame and folding his arms over his chest.

“I told him about the kiss,” I explained.

Nikiel nodded, an epiphanic expression crossing his face. “Ohhh, I get it. Yeah, it happened. But it totally sucked, Craig is the worst kisser I’ve ever met.”

I rolled my eyes. “You caught me off guard, first of all. And second of all, I didn’t want it to happen to begin with.”

He laughed. “Oh, yeah. Craig got so pissed at me for that. But whatever. I’m over it.” He stepped aside and gestured with his head into his apartment. “Why don’t you guys come in for a little bit? The game’s just starting.”

“Are you playing poker?” Tweek asked curiously, having been appeased by Nikiel’s response. “Because I’m _really_ good at poker.”

Nikiel’s smile fell from his face as he looked Tweek up and down. He almost looked confused, but after a second he must’ve seen something he liked, because his smile returned, twenty fold, and he said, “Tweek, man, you are too precious. No, golf. I’m watching alone, because I’m single and lonely, but you guys can come in if you want to!”

I exchanged a glance with Tweek. I don’t know what Tweek’s background on sports was, but, as a kid, I loved them. And then I grew up. And I stopped loving them, to the point where I cared so little, that I was surprised every year when my dad announced he was having a Superbowl Party. Even my mom was more in touch with it than I was. I just had better things to do with my time. And I was also an angsty teen with a minor alcohol problem.

But Nikiel looked so _excited_ at the prospect of us watching fucking _golf_ with him and I felt bad. And I could tell Tweek felt bad, too, because he tugged on my hand and lead me inside.

Nikiel’s apartment was just as clean as it always was, the floors spotless, the coffee table neatly organized, not a crooked picture frame in sight.

“GAH! It’s so _clean_ ,” Tweek marveled, his head moving around as he took in his surroundings.

“Thank you,” Nikiel said smugly. “I’m a bit of a neat freak.”

“I can -- NGH!-- _see_ that.”

“Yeah,” he said with a chuckle. “I’m pretty proud of it.” We all stood around for a few awkward seconds, before Nikiel groaned, and said, “Jesus, I forgot, you guys are guests. Sit down, make yourselves at home.”

I was completely comfortable doing that, considering I’d done it more than a couple times before. But Tweek seemed much more uncomfortable acting normal in someone else’s apartment. So I squeezed his hand, and pulled him to the couch, dragging him down so that he was sitting next to me. He was too nervous to argue, and just plopped himself down, pulling his feet up onto the couch, his knees to his chest.

I could tell by the look on Nikiel’s face that he was a little . . . not really irritated, or miffed, but more like he was ultra aware that he was probably going to have to clean his couch the second we left.

“Can I get you guys something to drink?” he said, instead of berating Tweek like someone like Kyle would’ve. “I know you like coffee, Tweek, I can make you some if you like? I’ve recently gotten hooked on these new Italian beans, and--”

Jesus, I guess I didn’t realize how much he talked. He was starting to sound like another gay guy that Tweek and I knew.

“GAH! Yeah, that’s--NGH!--that sounds awesome, man, thank you,” Tweek agreed with a jerky nod.

Nikiel nodded agreeably, and turned to me. “Craig?”

I shook my head but didn’t say anything.

Nikiel clicked his tongue and finger-gunned Tweek, a smirk on his face. “Alright, be right back, sugar bear.”

As soon as he left the room, I looked to Tweek, and saw him already looking at me, a confused expression on his face. “GAH! _Sugar bear_?” he asked, his eyes wide. “What does that _mean_?”

I shook my head. “I have no idea. But it’s not like you can do anything about it. He still calls me,” I scrunched up my nose, “Baby boy. I’ve told him like a million times to stop. It doesn’t work.”

“I could threaten him?” Tweek said, too casual.

I shook my head again. “Nope. Tried that.”

Tweek grumbled irritably, burrowing down into the couch. “Well, I’d--GAH!--rather be _sugar bear_ than _baby boy_.”

Okay, so I didn’t really agree with that, they both sucked balls hard. “If you say so.”

It took Nikiel about five more minutes for him to come back in, two cups of coffee in his hand. One was that dark brown, pretty much black color that was obviously for Tweek, and then another that was a dark tan-ish color, for Nikiel. Tweek perked up, and eagerly released my hand in exchange for the coffee.

I rolled my eyes in my mind. Some boyfriend he was, deserting me for coffee.

After settling down in his armchair, Nikiel reached for the TV remote on the coffee table, and clicked it on. It was already on the sports channel, and we were hit with the calm voice of the golf commentator.

“ _\--comes Pete Peters. He’s always had difficulty balancing the strength of his strokes with the wind speed, and we’ll just hope that he finds that equilibrium--_ ”

“It’s amateur golf. And arguably better than the PGA, ‘cause it’s better to see people who are mediocre at golf, than people who are really good at golf, you know? It’s like watching college football. But I do like the NFL, because some of the fans are so much fun to make fun of--”

As Nikiel blabbered on and on about nothing, I exchanged a glance with Tweek, and a thought passed between us, and that thought was,

 _Holy shit, this is gonna suck_.

* * *

Tweek and I spent like two hours with Nikiel in his apartment, and Nikiel _still_ seemed sad when Tweek and I unanimously agreed it was time to head back to our dorm room. Because, I mean, we had been there for two hours, watching _golf_ . Even when I was big on sports, golf was like one of the only sports that I actually hated, because it’s so fucking boring. And Nikiel didn’t even turn the TV off when we left, which meant he was going to watch _more_ golf, and just. Jesus, he was like an old British gay man that thought _Alien_ was better than _2001: A Space Odyssey_ , and used too many pet names.

For the majority of the day, before the sun went down, Tweek and I alternated between playing cards, eating, and watching X-Files.

All in all, it was a pretty awesome day.

At about one in the morning, I found myself resting on my back on my bed, with Tweek curled into my side. Classes started the next day, so we both figured that going to sleep a little earlier than we were used to was warranted. That didn’t mean that either of us were tired, though, so we just laid there in the dark.

Something was bothering Tweek. It didn’t take a genius to figure that out. He was quiet. Usually, Tweek would take the quiet atmosphere to talk my ear off about nonsense, but he was barely even making those twitching noises that he made.

“Everything okay, babe?”

A distressed sound escaped Tweek’s lips, and he looked up at me. I could barely see him in the moonlight, but I could tell he was very anxious. “Nikiel’s really lonely, isn’t he?”

That wasn’t really what I expected, but it didn’t surprise me. “Yeah, he is,” I agreed with a nod. “Desperately alone. I feel bad for him.”

“Do you think he needs a boyfriend?” Tweek asked hesitantly.

I thought for a second. That was a hard question to answer. Because it was hard to say if someone _needed_ someone else. Of course, people need other people in order to maintain some semblance of sanity, but to say that a person required romance depended on the situation. Maybe Nikiel just needed more friends. Or maybe he did need a boyfriend, maybe he longed for that connection. It was . . . hard to say.

“I think he needs a companion,” I settled on, hoping that would translate the way I wanted it to.

I guess it did, because Tweek made a vague noise of agreement, and then we fell silent together. I don’t know about him, but I was content to just breathe his air, to just lay with him without any interruptions. He was unusually still for an unusual amount of time. But then he redeemed himself by adjusting his body so that he was half laying on his stomach, with his face pressed into my neck and his arm wrapped around my waist. He cleared his throat and said, his voice was quiet, sincere, and apologetic, “I’m sorry, Craig.”

Okay, so, as far as I was concerned, he had nothing to be sorry for. “For what?”

Tweek sighed, his breath warm against my neck. “NGH!. . . _before_ , I shouldn’t have gotten mad. You--we weren’t dating or anything like that. You didn’t _cheat_ on me, because we weren’t--GAH!--together. So I’m sorry for getting mad.”

I brushed my fingers through his hair gently. “Don’t apologize. I understand why you were mad, but we worked it all out, right? And everything’s okay now.”

Tweek hummed, pressing a kiss to my neck absently. “Yeah, everything’s okay.”

We fell into that comforting silence again. I liked just laying with Tweek. His presence always cleared my mind, so having him wrapped around me was more therapeutic than literally anything else I could thing of.

“I have a question.”

I looked down at him when I heard him speak, intrigued by the slow confidence in his voice. “What is it?”

“Are we still gonna be like this six months from now?”

A beat of silence. I wasn’t entirely sure what he was asking, so I said, “Like what? Like still dating?”

“We _better_ still be dating six months from now,” Tweek said, his voice suddenly harsh.

I chuckled. “Okay, good. Then like what?”

Tweek lifted his head and observed me for a few silent seconds. “The honeymoon phase,” he said finally, his voice softer. “I don’t want it to end.”

I leaned my head up and kissed his forehead slowly. “Then it won’t.”

We were quiet for awhile, but his breathing was as fast as it usually was, and he kept moving around, so I knew he hadn’t fallen asleep yet. Like he would, it was only one in the morning.

“You know what we should do?” I asked suddenly.

“What?”

I started to sit up, slowly bringing him with me. “We should move the desk away from the window and make a pile of our mattresses and blankets and shit, and look at the stars. I can show you my favorite constellation.”

Tweek brightened at the suggestion and nodded. “GAH! Yeah, okay!”

And that’s the story of how Tweek and I discovered that the desk was bolted to the floor.

With a huff, Tweek plopped himself down on the corner of his bed. “Fuck, man. What do we do now?”

I joined him, stretching my legs out in front of me and crossing one ankle in front of the other. I understood Tweek’s disappointment; I was pretty disappointed, too. I was really looking forward to watching the stars with him. It was like, him and I had covered all the bases of a standard relationship, _except_ for star-watching. In every love story, there’s always this moment where the two people go star-watching. And, given both of our fascinations with space, I couldn’t believe it hadn’t happened yet. Even before we got together, ‘straight’ Craig would’ve loved to sit with Tweek and look at the stars.

So. Yeah. I was a little disappointed. But, thankfully, Engineer Tweek--or really just the Tweek that was amazing at coming up with shit--said, “NGH! Why don’t we just sit on the desk then? We’ll be higher up, it’ll be easier to see.”

I did that weird facial expression that’s really fucking hard to put into words. The one where your lips turn downwards, but it’s not a frown? Because one of my favorite things about Tweek was his ability to think outside of the box. I had made up my mind, my vision was Tweek and I sitting on a stack of mattresses, and it would’ve taken someone like Tweek to show me an alternate route that was way better than the one I’d thought of.

“Good idea,” I said with a nod, straightening up. So Tweek and I laid out one of our blankets on the desk, and then settled two pillows so our butts didn’t get too sore. We climbed up on top, and pulled the other blanket over our laps, because the window was fucking cold as shit.

I wrapped an arm around him and sighed contently when he rested his head on my shoulder.

I searched the sky for a few seconds, before I found the Little Dipper. “There,” I said, pointing towards a cluster of stars. “That’s my favorite constellation.” Our window just happened to have the perfect view, and I felt the corners of my lips twitch at the sight.

Tweek sighed and rested his head on my shoulder. “The Little Dipper.”

“Can you see it?” I asked.

There was a beat of silence before Tweek giggled. “No. But I see the big one.”

“It’s backwards,” I said, pressing my lips to the top of his head in a half-kiss. “And it’s tilting up.”

Tweek made a noise of understanding, and then he was quiet for a few seconds, before he perked up. “And it’s, like, 69ing with the Big Dipper?”

I snorted. “Yeah. That one.”

After that, Tweek and I fell silent, and we stayed that way for a long time. I don’t know what Tweek was thinking about, but I was hardly thing about anything. I was in this space of complete happiness, with Tweek in my arms and the sky in front of me.

So when I spoke, my words sounded far-away, and I don’t think I meant to say anything at all. “It’s so clear out tonight.”

“Yeah, it is,” Tweek said in the same hushed voice.

“I’m going to go to space one day,” I mumbled. I had no fucking clue what I was saying, it was just . . . words. Although, I did talk a lot when I was in the mood to. And I distinctly remember mentioning that Tweek brought that mood out more than I thought was possible. “When I’m an astrophysicist. I going to go to the stars, and study the unknown, and further mankind’s knowledge of the universe.”

“Don’t leave me for an alien,”

was the only response from Tweek I got. It made this fond smile come to my face, and I directed my attention from the night sky to Tweek’s profile. He was staring out the window with his wide, hazel eyes, his lips parted slightly in his in depth study. Fucking adorable.

I rested my cheek on top of his head. “I won’t leave you for an alien.”

“Promise?” Tweek mumbled, tilting his head down so that it was resting on my shoulder. “Because you’re hot so they’ll obviously abduct you, and then they’ll probe you, and you’re gay, so you’ll probably like it.”

The weirdest thing about Tweek’s comment was that he didn’t even sound like he was joking. “I don’t think I’ll be abducted by aliens. But even if I do. I promise.”

“Good,” he said under his breath.

I love that that was a genuine concern of his. He truly and honestly was my favorite person. And the weirdest person ever.

There are plenty of weird people in the world. Really, everyone is weird one way or another, whether it’s obvious or not. Me? I’m weird, of course I am. Not to sound like a hipster, but I’ve kind of embraced the parts of me that are different from other people. One of the biggest examples I can give is the fact that I threw birthday parties for my guinea pigs. I made a little party hat for Stripe #1, 2, 3, and 4, and I bought a cake from the grocery store, and I let all the Stripes have as many treats as they wanted. That was a little trivia fact about myself that I hadn’t told anyone before, because I’d be made fun of for, you know. Being weird.

Tweek was weird in the sense that he believed almost everything. He firmly believed in aliens, and that the government was hiding extraterrestrial specimens in Area 51. (Although I was on board with that one, considering that aliens practically lived in South Park.) He believed that 9/11 and the attack on Pearl Harbor were both inside jobs. He believed in the New World Order, and the large presence of the Illuminati in world politics and consumer media. He believed that the government purposely spread AIDs to black and gay men in the 80s. (Another theory I could get on board with, because it was the 80s, and that totally made sense.)

He’d even tossed around the idea of lizard people, but he said he was unsure. The evidence, to him, wasn’t compelling. He talked about that shit for hours, explaining the evidence, and then disproving everything he had said.

And he never believed anything a president said. Not one of them. Because they all did shady shit, and it was dangerous to blindly follow the US government.

God, he was so fucking adorable, my cute little paranoid boyfriend.

I was stirred from my musings when Tweek said, his voice small, “You’ll make an awesome astrophysicist.”

My insides melted as his sheepish words. “Thanks, babe.”

Tweek hummed, but didn’t say anything.

I figured I should probably answer him, to at least return the compliment, and I didn’t even have to fake it when I said, “And, you know, you’d make a pretty good engineer.”

There was a pause and then Tweek lifted his head, and, when he caught my eye, he raised an eyebrow. “An engineer?”

I blinked at him. “Isn’t that what you’re studying? Engineering?”

“Well, _yeah_ , civil engineering, but how’d you know, I never told you!”

I shrugged. “When you built the fort. It was really good. And you’re always drawing so that’s got something to do with it, right?”

“I mean, I guess so,” he said thoughtfully. “But I usually draw, like, physically impossible, not structurally sound buildings.”

“That sounds really cool, you should show me sometime,” I said. And as soon as those words left my mouth, I remembered something. A very specific promise he’d made to me the night before. “Speaking of, you still owe me a star.”

Tweek looked over at me, his eyes wide, but very happy. “GAH! Oh, Jesus, I totally forgot about that!”

“I didn’t.”

He giggled, apparently very pleased that I had remembered. Because it meant I was listening, and Tweek had told me before that he was used to being ignored. It worked out great, because a lot of the time, I found myself incapable of ignoring him.

“So. Do you draw things besides structurally unsound buildings?” I asked.

Tweek twitched noticeably underneath my arm, his giggles fading by my question. “Uh--NGH!--yeah. . . .”

He sounded hesitant, and I was instantly intrigued. “What do you draw?”

More hesitation. He must’ve been really embarrassed by whatever the hell it was, and I found that _very_ amusing. “Uh, well--”

“Let me guess,” I interrupted, in the attempt to lighten the mood a bit. “You’re into hentai and--”

Tweek burst out into soft laughter. “Shut up, Craig, it’s nothing like that! It’s . . . it’s actually, sorta, more like . . . um . . . mmm . . .” He quickly fell sheepish again, and I smiled at the sky.

“You don’t have to tell me, honey,” I said. “I mean, you do, at some point, but I just kind of sprung it on you without warning --”

“I draw you.”

I blinked a few times, before turning my head to look at him. His face matched what his words sounded like, stressed and nervous. He was pointedly ignoring me, his eyes wide and his teeth gnawing his bottom lip.

“I . . . I draw you,” he repeated through a sigh.

My face heated up and I turned away, my nerves not allowing me to look at him anymore. “Oh. Well. That’s nice of you.”

Tweek barked a single beat of laughter, and it was adorably awkward and uncomfortable. “Yeah, well. It’s easy to. Once you get into a video, or an article, or a story, you don’t move for hours. Did you notice that? You stay in the exact same position until you turn your computer off and go to sleep.”

I quirked my lips thoughtfully. I hadn’t noticed that. “Well, you’re welcome for that, I guess. Anything else?”

“Anything else what?”

“Do you draw anything _besides_ buildings and me?”

Another pause. “I have someone else that I like to draw. His name is Herald,” he said softly. “He has huge eyes and wears overalls. I’ve been drawing him since I was a kid.”

“Was he like a kid you knew?”

Tweek fell silent, a reaction I wasn’t expecting. I was mostly expecting him to tell me this long story about a kid he went to school with that was actually nice to him, or a guy he had a crush on that he’d known for awhile or something. But his face kind of slipped into a soft frown.

“Did I ever tell you about how my Uncle Bryan died?” he settled on finally.

I shook my head. I could sense a very serious, very heart-wrenching conversation coming, so I wrapped an arm around his waist and pulled him close to me, prompting him to rest his head on my shoulder. “No.”

Tweek fell silent again, like he was gathering his thoughts, and figuring out how to word his story.

“My Uncle Bryan committed suicide,” he said quietly, “When I was eleven.”

Like a punch, I felt Tweek’s words in my chest. You know, I had an immense gratitude for Tweek’s Uncle Bryan, because he was really all Tweek had growing up. Tweek’s parents were absolute shit, and he had no friends, and the only person that was nice to him was his mother’s brother, his Uncle Bryan. Tweek talked so _highly_ of him whenever he came up in conversation, always talking about how Bryan would take him on boat rides, and go hiking with him, and how Bryan would always ask about his life. It was nice to listen to, but Tweek would inevitably trail off and get this thoughtful, forlorn expression on his face.

I knew that he had died at some point, but Tweek generally skirted around the subject without going into too much detail.

“He was . . . he was always really--GAH!-- _sad_ , man. So fucking sad, all the time. And he always told me I reminded him of his son. Herald. He, uh. Died in a house fire, when he was four.”

“So you draw your cousin?” I murmured, just to show Tweek that I was following along, and that he could keep going and going for forever, and I would still keep listening.

He nodded, and sighed slowly. “Yeah. I used to draw him for Bryan. I would take the pictures of Herald that my uncle gave me, and I would draw them, put them in a little comic strip that I called _Herald the Angel_. But when I was eleven we ran out of pictures, and there was this light that went out in Uncle Bryan’s eyes, I could see it. It was a couple weeks later when my parents sat me down and told me.”

I was about to say something, anything, even though I wasn’t really sure what, when a short chuckle, garbled and almost unrecognizable, came from Tweek’s throat.

“Uncle Bryan left almost everything to me in his will, and my parents actually . . . they took everything that he left for me. At the time, I was furious, but now I’ve just become numb to everything about that entire fucking year.”

Jesus. Fucking. _Christ_.

I hated everything about Tweek’s parents, they made a small little fire in my chest burn with the fiery passion of a million suns, and I had to fucking bite my entire bottom lip to stop myself from going on a verbal rampage, that probably would’ve involved me threatening their lives.

He was eleven. His favorite person in the entire world just fucking killed himself. His favorite person then gives him everything. He had all this shit to remember his uncle by, and his parents fucking _take_ it all?

“Was that--” I started quietly, trying to hide how fucking furious I was, but I was cut short when Tweek shook his head. He knew what I was going to ask. I kind of had a feeling that that was the worse thing that Tweek’s parents had done, but at the same time, I knew Tweek wouldn’t just bring it up so casually in conversation. When he did tell me, it would be an entire afternoon event. Or an entire weekend event. If it was as bad as he was making it sound, he wouldn’t drop it without extensive warning or emotional build-up.

Tweek meekly cleared his throat and said, “You know, sometimes I draw me, too.”

I accepted the fact that Tweek wanted to change the subject. I totally understood, and I rolled with it, knowing that if Tweek wanted to keep talking, he would’ve. I trusted that he’d talk to me whenever he needed to, so I turned to look at him and asked, “You draw yourself?”

“Well,” he said slowly, lifting his head. “I draw me. _With_ you. Not by myself.”

A grin picked at the corner of my mouth. “What are we doing?”

He shrugged, but actually glanced at me, his eyes wide and warm and hesitant. “Holding hands. Hugging. Playing Go Fish.” He looked away again, very obviously blushing. “Kissing.”

I chuckled. “Well now I _have_ to see it--”

Tweek groaned, closing his eyes. “Don’t tease me, it’s embarrassing.”

“Yes, it is,” I agreed, nodding, and basking in the half-hearted glare he sent in my direction. “But I’m happy you drew them, and I can’t wait to see them. When you’re ready.”

“Soon,” Tweek said, giving me a small smile. “I think you’ll like them. I always draw you more attractive than you really are.”

I laughed. “I don’t know if I should be offended by that.”

“Don’t be,” Tweek said, letting out a few giggle-laughs of his own. “I think you’re the most handsome man I’ve ever seen.”

It took a few seconds, but when those words clicked in my brain, my entire face and neck and both of my ears turned bright red. I couldn’t see them, but they were radiating heat. I still couldn’t take compliments the right way; it was just like being nice, it wasn’t something I could just do. I didn’t know how to react, so I tried to hide my face away from him as best I could. “Oh.”

Tweek laughed again, but he sounded slightly embarrassed, too. “That’s the part where you say ‘thank you’.”

“Oh,” I said, nodding. “Yeah, thanks. And, for what it’s worth, I think you’re the cutest thing that’s ever existed. I think you’re cuter than guinea pigs. But not just _one_ guinea, _all_ the guinea pigs. Combined.”

Tweek snorted. “That’s the weirdest compliment I’ve ever gotten.”

I smirked. “Shut up. And that’s the part where you say ‘thank you’, honey.”

I turned to look at Tweek at the same time Tweek apparently went to kiss my cheek, and he caught me on the corner of my mouth. He reeled back as soon as we made contact, squealing nervously, and he put his free hand against his mouth. “GAH!” he said, his voice muffled. “I was aiming for your cheek!”

As embarrassed as I was, I knew that Tweek was exponentially _more_ embarrassed, so I smiled at his wide-eyed expression and said, “Tweek. You’re my boyfriend. You’re allowed to kiss me whenever you want to. In fact, I encourage it. It’s nice kissing you.”

“Oh,” Tweek said, taking his hand from his mouth and giving me an adorable smile. “Okay. It’s nice kissing you, too. You know, I think about kissing you a lot,” Tweek continued, his voice casual and almost oblivious, like he had no idea how much he was totally flustering me. “Man, you have no _idea_ how many dreams I’ve had about just kissing you.”

I was embarrassed, of course I was, but I intrigued more than anything else. “That sounds like something you should elaborate on.” I knew that my face would melt off of my head if he told me more, but I liked hearing it. It made my insides feel all happy.

Tweek blinked a few times, confused. “I thought you already knew all about it? You caught me mid-dream one time . . . right? Or . . . or did you leave before it happened?”

I looked away, thinking back to all the times I’d woken before Tweek. Which was plenty of times, but I did remember the one occasion that I heard Tweek moaning and muttering in his sleep. The entire thirty seconds that I’d listened to it, I went on this wild roller coaster of emotions. To start, I was horny the second I woke up because of the Tweek-oriented really hot wet dream I’d had. And then I heard Tweek moaning, which made me even more horny, and then he actually fucking moaned my name. That almost made me explode. But then he said someone else’s name, and it was like that film tool that 80’s and 90’s movies used a lot, where the screen freezes and that record scratch sound plays. And some narrator usually says something like, “Yeah, yeah, I know what you’re thinking.”

And then I was irritated but still kind of horny.

It was just a weird morning all around.

“I remember something like that, but I thought it was about Kenny?”

Tweek scoffed, rolling his eyes. “There you go with Kenny again. That dream wasn’t about him. He wasn’t even in it, you and I were talking about him. I was telling you that him and I were just friends. That dream was about _you_. It’s . . . it’s _always_ about you.”

Tweek’s words made my breath catch in my throat, and the sheepish, nervous, cute as all fucking fuck expression on his face made my heart swell about a million times in size. And at the look he was giving me, I started to despise all the space between us, despite the fact that he was already tucked under my arm. So I pivoted my body a little bit so that I was facing him, and I gently manhandled him so he was facing me, too.

Tweek let me do all of that, a small smile on his face, and he watched me intently, his eyes half-lidded and curious.

“Tweek,” I said quietly, placing a hand gently on his cheek. He hummed in response, nuzzling my palm happily, and, in that moment, a surge of affection for him pressed against my rib cage and sped up my heart. He just . . . he was just so . . . so fucking _awesome_ , I never wanted him to leave, ever. I wanted him to stay with me, by my side, forever. “Jesus, Tweek,” I breathed, and, when I couldn’t take it anymore, I leaned down the rest of the way, pressing my lips to his.

He didn’t seem very surprised by my action. Actually, his lips were already puckered by the time I reached him, and we quickly slipped into a gentle rhythm.

After a minute or two, Tweek pulled the blanket from our laps, and then yanked the pillow out from under me, throwing it somewhere else. I didn’t want to pull away, so I just rolled with it, deciding he had a good reason.

And that good reason was realized when he pushed at one of my shoulders, making me lay down on my back again. Almost immediately, he shifted his body so that he was straddling my waist, his trembling hands massaging my chest. I hummed appreciatively. I didn’t think I could take separating for even a second. I was in Tweek Mode, and that was a mode of mine that was not easily broken.

I moaned, running my hands along his thighs and up his waist, sliding my fingers under his shirt to brush against his soft, warm skin. He shivered, tilting his head and deepened the kiss, which, to be fucking honest, was getting to be pretty much as deep as kisses could go.

I liked being on top, it gave me a sense of control that I just really liked having. But fuck, there was something about having Tweek resting on top of me, one hand clutching at my sweatshirt just over my heart, the other propping him up just next to my head, so close his fingers were brushing gently against the curve of my ear.

I cracked an eye open. It was fairly dark, but there was a soft, relaxed expression on his face, his eyes shut delicately, an obvious blush on his pale cheeks. That surge of affection grew to almost painful levels, and I clutched tightly at his waist to keep myself grounded. I’m not entirely sure why that moment felt so profound. Compared to other things we’d done, it wasn’t exactly intense, but it somehow . . . was. It was ultra sexual without being more than a simple makeout session between recently established boyfriends.

Needing a quick breather, I parted our lips with a soft smacking noise. My eyes slid open completely, and when I caught Tweek’s gaze, I was met with a shine in his eyes that I had only seen twice before. It was telling. And I was hit with the realization that Tweek’s legs were firmly placed on either side of me, our groins aligned dangerously, and it was suddenly more than a simple makeout session between recently established boyfriends.

“We’re . . . on a desk,” he mumbled to me, a slow awareness sharpening the features of his face.

I swallowed, looking away from Tweek’s body, like I’d forgotten where we were. “Oh. Yeah, I guess so.”

There was a long stretch of inactivity. My hands, which had previously been holding fast to his waist, had loosened their grip and slid down to his hips. He still had a hand to my heart, and I could feel my rapid heartbeat reverberating back to me from the pressing of his palm. I caught his eyes again, and I kid you fucking not, the world came to a stop around me. He was staring down at me, his eyes wide and just fucking radiating lust. I could feel the need and the want coming off of him in waves, and I was sure he was picking up those same vibes from me.

Because you better fucking believe I needed him, and I wasn’t lacking in the want department, either.

And it would have been so easy to just pin him down and fucking devour him. The look he was giving me told me he wouldn’t exactly mind me doing that, and my dick had long been stirring in my jeans at the gentle weight of Tweek on top of me.

I could sit up and bring my arms around his body, holding him tight to my chest and whispering praises in his ear, because I wanted him to know how fucking special I thought he was. I could curl Tweek’s legs around me and bring him with me as I stood, carrying him across the room and dropping him backwards onto my bed. I could strip the clothes from his body, one article at a time, and hold his eyes, even when he got flushed and nervous and wanted nothing more than to look away. I could pin his arms above his head and kiss the breath from his lungs. I could cover his entire neck and chest and both shoulders with love bites until he was writhing underneath me, his hands clutching at my hair and pulling hard enough to sting. I could grip his thighs, spread his legs, grab his hips and fuck him until he was trembling and calling out my name.

But there was just one thing keeping me still in place.

I didn’t want to lose control of myself. I wanted to be aware of everything, I wanted to be able to memorize every second of our first time with clarity. I wanted to be able to reflect back on every kiss, on every slip of our tongues, of every single movement, no matter how subtle. The point is, I didn’t want it to happen that night. I was too far gone, and it was too sudden. And I was really worried that I was leading Tweek on by not telling him all that, and letting him believe we were going to take the next step.

But, if I’m being 100% honest, if Tweek started touching me again, I really would’ve just lost my head. And I would’ve let him do whatever he wanted, because I liked it when Tweek was happy.

I know that makes me sound like a total pussy, but in that moment my body and my mind were two separate entities existing next to each other. The connection between the two had been severed the second Tweek had pushed me on my back. My body would’ve KO’d my mind, and taken over the situation, and I didn’t fucking _want_ that. I liked my mind, I liked having it sharp and in the moment. It gave me that control that I felt like I needed all the time, and I didn’t want to part with it so suddenly.

And I was about five seconds from breaking, and confessing all of that, when Tweek, without warning, shuddered on top of me.

“I . . . I can’t,” he said, his shaky, jittery voice interrupting the long stretch of silence. He straightened up quickly and shifted his legs down so that he was sitting criss-crossed between my legs. “GAH! NGH! Not on a desk, not now, I just _can’t_ , man!”

I let out a breath, giving him a relieved grin as I sat myself up. “Thank fuck, me neither.” Like I said, I didn’t want it to be a hasty last-minute thing, I wanted it to be special, I wanted to save it for a weekend that neither of us had anything to do, so that we could focus entirely on each other and not worry about other people.

We had classes the next day.

And besides classes, we were going to, no doubt, be harassed by at _least_ three people.

So.

I just.

I don’t know.

I loved him so much, you know?

It was one of those things.

I leaned forward and gave him a slow, very vanilla kiss, before turning back to the window. I waited until he caught his breath and copied me, before I said,

“You know, the Little Dipper isn’t a constellation.”

Tweek let out a little laugh. “Oh yeah?”

“Yeah,” I said with a nod. “It’s actually an asterism in a constellation. Ursa Minor, the Little Bear. I just say constellation because it sounds way less arrogant than asterism. And you want to know something else cool? The bowl of the Little Dipper consists of the brightest stars of Ursa Minor. It’s even got the North Star, the one that sailors and shit used to navigate at night? That one.”

He snorted. “You’re a total space nerd, you know that?” There was a bit of a pause before he added, “Um. But, just curious -- GAH! What’s an asterism?”

I grinned up at the sky. Fucking Tweek. Because everybody else I knew would have told me to shut the fuck up the second the word ‘asterism’ left my mouth.


	26. Baby Boy, I Think I'm In Love

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, so I'm terribly sorry for this chapter being so late. The deeper into this story I get, for some reason the harder it is to pump out chapters. I haven't figured out why yet, just know that I really am trying to get these chapters out as fast as I can, while also keeping up a quality that I deem worthy for publication.
> 
> Sorry again, and I hope you enjoy.
> 
> Also, as kind of a warning, this is predominantly about OC's, and it's also pretty dialogue-heavy, so if you get bored with characters outside of canon, it wouldn't harm the progression of the plot to skip this chapter, although I sincerely hope you stick around!

Reading comprehension -- the first class Monday morning. I would’ve hated it, but Tweek and I actually had that class _together_. It was the first time that that had ever happened, and I was really happy. We could walk into class together, and walk out of class together, and study the same material and have it actually make sense. Before, we could help each other study, but it was almost like a chore, because whenever I had to read off some flashcards for Tweek, I had no idea what was going on. It was almost like looking at other people’s vacation photos. Really, really boring.

Tweek and I went to sleep on his bed the night before. I liked sleeping in the same bed as him; I liked that that was an option. And the wake-up process was very similar; my alarm wasn’t loud enough to wake him up, so I gently shook him a couple times before I had to inevitably smack him in the face with a pillow or repeatedly flick his forehead to get him to get up.

And he yelled at me, which I expected, and it was so nice and familiar and made my insides all warm, even if it was just a simple interaction. That warm feeling would probably fade after the honeymoon phase ended, but for the time being, I decided to just enjoy it.

* * *

Tweek and I were a little early leaving our room, so there were only a few other people in the classroom waiting for class to start. I didn’t know any of them, thank fuck.

We made our way to the front of the classroom; Tweek liked sitting in the front, I remembered him telling me, because he wanted his focus to be entirely on the teacher so that he didn’t miss any crucial information. I was the same that way; if I sat too close to the other students, some people might be compelled to talk to me, and I wasn’t there for that. There was something about sitting in the front of a room that emphasized the ‘fuck the fuck off’ aura that I liked emitting.

“I’m excited to have a class with you,” I told Tweek as we both sat down somewhere in the middle of the front row. “I’ve always been curious what you’re like in class.” Read as: I really hope he’s not obnoxious and won’t bug me when the teacher is talking. Although, I didn’t really take Tweek for the type to slack off during class; he’d be too afraid of falling behind to even attempt it.

“I don’t talk, I don’t make eye contact with anyone, and I pay attention,” Tweek said, rolling his eyes, and plopping his binder and books on his desk.

I nodded my approval. “Good. Just make sure you especially don’t make eye contact with me because then I won’t be able to pay attention.”

Tweek’s cheeks turned pink and he punched halfheartedly at my shoulder. “Shut up, Craig.”

I grinned at him, resting my chin on my fist and observing him thoughtfully out of the corner of my eye. I really was pretty pumped to have a class with him, I liked the idea.

The room got progressively louder the more people started shoving their way inside, and I glanced at the door in annoyance. I immediately caught side of some . . . unfortunately familiar faces. Two of the four assholes that I demolished all those months ago were making their way inside. They looked just as douchy as I remembered, those damn salmon colored shorts, (honestly, it was January, would it really kill them to admit defeat and wear pants like every other sane person on earth), and baggy sweatshirts that had the name of their high school printed on the front. Protectiveness flared in my chest, and I caught the eye of one of them, delivering a dangerous glare at him. He stared back for a couple seconds, but glanced away with an eye roll. So maybe he wasn’t exactly scared of me anymore, which was a bit of a bummer, (I really did enjoy when I was feared, mostly from the right people), but he didn’t look like he was going to attempt any kind of communication with us, which was really all I wanted. His friend didn’t even notice us.

Stan was in that class, too. Which was. Good. I guess. I couldn’t really care less. That is, until he sat down next to me and pulled a binder from his backpack.

“Hey guys,” he said, obnoxiously tapping a pen on the desk.

“GAH!” Tweek greeted.

“Hi,” I said in a flat voice.

“How’s it going?”

“NGH!”

“Fine.”

Stan nodded, opening up his notebook and drawing a circle on a blank page. And then he drew another circle, and then another circle, and it was the most useless doodling I’d ever seen. He wasn’t even drawing anything substantial; when I doodled, I doodled planets and constellations and shit. I’d tried to peek at Tweek’s notes to see what kinds of things he doodled, but he had always slammed shut his notebooks before I could see, but, considering the fact that he was drawing all the fucking time, I imagine it was something creative. Not a bunch of fucking _circles_.

“This is my second class with Palermo,” Stan said. Palermo was the name of our teacher. “He’s okay. But he’s a really hard grader, and can actually tell if you put off assignments to the last second.”

He must not be familiar with my work, I remember thinking immediately. I was the king of procrastination. Even though I tried to be more on top of my work, sometimes situations were out of my hands and I had to put assignments off till the last second. And, because I had taught myself how to work quickly with good enough results, it always worked out for me in the end.

“GAH! Oh, Jesus, what if I fail!” Tweek screeched, his hands flying up to his hair. He caught the attention of a considerable amount of people. Some rolled their eyes, which meant that they already knew about Tweek, and some quirked their eyebrows, which meant they didn’t already know about Tweek. Either way, everyone had a reaction.

“I can’t fail!” he continued. “My parents will disown me and I’ll have to bounce between homeless shelters and live off of spam and fountain water, and I’ll probably freeze to death in an alley!”

Well, first of all, I failed to see how his parents disowning him was a bad thing. They didn’t deserve Tweek, who was the greatest fucking person I knew. Because if Tweek was ever disowned, (like I”m pretty sure I’ve mentioned before), he mostly definitely wouldn’t be alone. He’d have me.

And second of all, “You’re not going to fail,” I said, reaching over and taking Tweek’s hands gently from his hair.

“GAH! You don’t know that!”

“I do know that,” I said calmly. “Because you’re smart, and because I’m in this class with you and we can study together.”

“Jesus Christ, you guys are gay,” Stan said, and when I glanced over at him, he was dramatically rolling his eyes.

I gave him a deadpanned look. “Well. Funny story.”

Before Stan had a chance to be a total dick back, another familiar face plopped in the seat next to Tweek. Jack, the guy who thought we were friends. “Hey guys.”

“NGH! Hi!” Tweek greeted politely, in an anxiously sharp voice.

“Hi, dude,” I said with a resigned sigh. Okay, so I had a class with two people that I knew. That wasn’t . . . too bad. Besides, Stan didn’t talk too much. At least, not without his goons around. And Jack didn’t shut up, but if I was a dick enough to him, he might realize that I actually took school seriously.

“It’s like, now that we’re friends, I’m seeing you guys everywhere,” Jack said thoughtfully, pulling out a notebook and a planner. I watched on in dumbstruck awe as he opened it. It was so fucking organized. His planner was color-coordinated, his handwriting impeccably neat, his lines almost completely straight, his sentences and notes not gradually curling up or down. But it was also somehow sad. Because it was almost entirely empty, the only events he had in there that I could read from where I was, (he wrote fairly large), were the dates of his classes. I mean, it’s not like I had plans that extended beyond my education, but it seemed a lot more pitiful when it was written down.

“But that’s a good thing, right?” Jack continued, oblivious to the pitying attention on him. “Because at least I won’t be all alone in all of my classes.” There he went with being alone again; he really needed a friend, someone who didn’t half hate him like I did.

“And did you see? Dick and dack are over there,” Jack added, nodding in the jock asshole’s direction.

Stan’s eyes flicked over at Jack. “Dick and dack?”

“Uh, yeah,” Jack said, looking over at Stan with an awkward, lopsided smile. “Dick and dack because they’re both dicks and I needed something to rhyme with dick to make it catchy.” His cheeks were tinted pink, his eyes hesitant, and I rolled my eyes. I wasn’t exactly the best at recognizing attraction, (I totally misfired on every relationship I’d ever seen, because I could never anticipate whoever was involved ever being together), but not even the dumbest of asses would’ve missed the intrigue in the way Jack was looking at Stan.

I scrunched up my nose. Because seriously? _Stan Marsh_? I failed to see what was so great about him. He was voted one of the cutest boys in school on several lists throughout the years, and I just never fucking understood why. Maybe he just wasn’t my type, I don’t fucking know. But I always thought Kyle was more attractive than him, even if it was more of a passing thought.

“But . . . dack doesn’t rhyme with dick,” Stan said, furrowing his eyebrows.

 _Jesus Christ, we have a fucking Einstein in the room_.

“But . . . it’s still catchy, right?” Jack asked, laughing awkwardly, and almost desperately, like he was determined to get Stan to like him. Jesus fuck, what a useless gay. “You’ve gotta have some kind of catch phrase, maybe that should be mine, calling people dick and dack. Although dick and dack fits the situation pretty good, right? Don’t want to overuse it like Urkel, that got old so quickly and I actually stopped watching the show after a while because I just couldn’t stand hearing it anymore. But, uh. What do you think? And, I’m sorry, dude, I didn’t get your name?” They had met before, but the circumstances were weird to say the least, so they probably didn’t remember each other, even though it had happened just the day before.

“Stan,” he answered skeptically.

“Right, cool name,” Jack said, and I could feel the nerves wafting off of him. I wanted to just slap a hand over his mouth to stop him from embarrassing himself, because I was starting to feel the cringe in my fucking bones. “My name’s Jack.”

And then -- this fucking desperate asshole -- stood up and reached over Tweek and I to get to Stan, _just_ to shake his hand.

Stan quirked his eyebrows and hesitantly reached over and, very quickly, shook Jack’s hand. He dropped his arm almost immediately and frowned. He was starting to look uncomfortable, like he had finally caught onto what was happening. “Nice to meet you,” he said awkwardly. “Uh, so. _Wendy_ , um. My girlfriend is doing good.”

Wow. Smooth.

At Stan’s words, Jack frowned disappointedly and slouched in his seat. Poor guy.

Just then, the king of being everywhere at once, Kenny plopped himself in the seat on the other side of Stan. It was kind of weird; I’d come to think that Kenny just pretended to go to college, because I had no idea how he managed to balance all his jobs, with his schoolwork, with his social life. It didn’t seem possible, and I had never heard any of the guys mention having a class with him. At least, not that I could remember, so it was a little jarring to see him pull out a binder and a pen and set them both neatly in front of him. “Hey, guys.”

I was getting a little annoyed at the fact that I fucking knew all these people. I didn’t want a class with a bunch of fuckers that I knew. It’s like seeing someone you know out in public when you just want to get your errands done as quickly as possible without getting wrapped up in bullshit small talk. But at least I had Tweek with me, to soften the aura of dumbassness that Jack, Kenny, and Stan unanimously emitted.

“Hi, Kenny,” Tweek greeted, grinning.

Kenny smiled back. “Hey, Tweek. How’s your morning going?”

“GAH! Good!”

It was at that very moment that a loud throat clear rang out in the classroom. All eyes turned to the front, and I raised an eyebrow at the sight of the teacher. I had never seen a human being look more like an insect in my entire life. He was squeezed into a long-sleeved, button-up shirt, with a plain black tie that only reached to his third button from the top, tucked into a pair of black slacks. His stomach was bulging over his pants, the belt apparently hooked one hole too small, but for some reason he didn’t look uncomfortable. He had olive skin, but it looked almost green, and he had thick glasses too big for his face, magnifying his eyes to a disturbingly large size. He had a long hooked nose and was sporting a greasy comb-over. There was briefcase resting on the desk behind him, polished and pristine looking. I immediately didn’t like him.

“Welcome to Reading Comprehension,” Palmero said. He enunciated all of his words perfectly, (to the point where he was trying way too hard), and he had one of those voices that you could tell belonged to an overweight man, if that makes sense. It lessened the intimidating impact that he was definitely going for. “My name is Dr. George Palermo, and, because I spent the time and money to earn my doctorate, I expect to be addressed as such.”

Great, he was the ‘I’m a doctor’ type. I guess I understood it; becoming a doctor is pretty impressive, but some of them could be such smug assholes sometimes.

“Before we read through the class syllabus, I want to make a few things clear, so there is no confusion in the future. Attendance is mandatory. You may miss one class, with a plausible reason, while giving me at least a three hour notice before class begins. I understand strenuous circumstances, and this may be negotiated in private. Tardiness is not tolerated, and these doors will be closed at exactly 9:00, and any stragglers will not be allowed entry.

“If class ends early, you are not permitted to leave this classroom. I have you all for the allocated time listed on your schedules, and I am unwilling to compromise on this. Plan to stay for the duration, or do not attend, at your own discretion.”

The rules weren’t unreasonable, (they were about what most teachers expected), but it was the way he worded it, like he was under the impression that every student in every class of his had zero work ethic. It made his teaching style seem very intimidating. I wasn’t intimidated, because if that guy thought I was going to be afraid of him, he had another flavor of pie coming for him, but I could understand why other people would think that.

And I could fucking feel the terror and nerves emanating from Tweek’s direction. My fingers twitched; I wanted to reach over and at least hold his hand to try to comfort him. But I stopped before I did, because me trying to comfort him would just distract him. And I didn’t think that that was a very good idea.

“A warning. It is very difficult to pass this class. In the thirty-five years I’ve been teaching at this institution, only seven students have received a 100%. I don’t give A+ to just anyone; you must prove to me that you’ve earned it.

“Now,” Palermo continued, moving to one side of the room and handing some poor unsuspecting student a huge stack of papers. He even moved like he had a stick up his ass. “I’m handing out the syllabus now. Notice that my phone number is not on there. If you wish to contact me, the only way to do so is to email me via my school-issued email address. However, if I receive any message from any of you that is not school related, I will not respond.”

And then for the entire class, Palermo discussed the syllabus. The entire fucking class, almost two hours of some fat fuck explaining assignments that wouldn’t even be officially assigned for months. I zoned out after maybe half an hour, which maybe wasn’t a great idea, considering how dick-ish our teacher was, but seriously, it was so fucking boring, I couldn’t stand it.

* * *

By the time class ended, (we didn’t get to leave until it was exactly 10:45), everybody was about ready to die. I didn’t understand how Stan could possibly think Palermo ‘wasn’t that bad’, because he was actually horrible.

Tweek and I held hands on the way back to our dorm room and, because he lived right next to us, Jack decided to tag along. Which meant he talked. “What’d you guys think of Palermo?” Jack asked, tucking his notebook under his arm.

I glanced over at him out of the corner of my eye. “He fucking sucks.”

“I don’t know, I kind of liked him,” Jack said casually. He seemed to have gotten over his disappointing discovery of Stan’s sexuality. “I like how straightforward he is.”

Palermo wasn’t straightforward. He was a dick. The line is subtle, but it exists, and Palermo had surpassed ‘blunt’, and turned into a ‘cunt’. He was ready on the offense about everything. But whatever, apparently Jack’s judgement was a little askew.

Tweek’s response was about what I expected. “GAH! What are you _talking_ about?! He’s not straightforward, he’s fucking _terrifying_ , this semester’s going to be awful!”

I stroked the back of Tweek’s hand with my thumb. “It’ll be okay. We can study together, and if Palermo gives you shit, I’ll give him shit right back.”

It took a few seconds, but Tweek let out a relieved breath at my reassurance, and nodded. “NGH! Yeah, okay. It’ll be okay. Just -- GAH! -- don’t get on his bad side, okay? I don’t want your body upside down in a ditch somewhere with your heart missing and your head in Palermo’s freezer!”

“In order for that to happen, Palermo would have to actually be in shape to catch me.”

Tweek slapped my shoulder, giving me a scowl. “GAH! _DON’T JOKE ABOUT MURDER!_ ”

I chuckled, but decided to move on. “Alright, alright. Sorry. But seriously, this semester won’t be all that bad. I promise.”

“You two are so sweet,” Jack interrupted. “Maybe one day, when someone decides that I’m good enough to stick around with, I’ll have a relationship like yours. That’d be cool.”

Most of the time, when Jack talked about being lonely, I just rolled my eyes because of the whole ‘over-sharing’ thing. I hated when people overshared, but that probably had a lot to do with my need to be as private as possible. That one particular comment, however, got to me a little. Ever since I’d met him, I had always kind of felt bad for Jack, but him being so blatantly open about his total lack of self esteem, (and it didn’t even seem like he was attention seeking, it was just him talking about nothing and everything), made him seem a little more than just some dumbass who needed someone to pal around with.

“Yeah,” was all I said.

“It’s awesome, man!” Tweek added. I wasn’t sure if Tweek was aware of it, but I’m sure him proclaiming his happiness being in a relationship probably wasn’t doing a whole lot for Jack.

“I bet it is,” Jack continued. “And it’s even better, because you two are roommates, so you get to hang out all the time, it’s like living together. And you guys are obviously soulmates,” I blushed at his wording, “so it’s nice that you two know each other’s habits now, instead of later. Get all the nasty shit out of the way right off the bat, it’s good. I wish I had a cool roommate, but nope. Tyler was _so_ weird. Him and his cockroaches, why couldn’t I get a cute gay guy? You two must’ve really done something to please the universe to get so lucky. And hey, speaking of getting lucky, I didn’t hear you guys last night. Finally taking a break?”

I groaned through a flush and glared at him. Tweek “GAH!”’d, and squeezed my hand, embarrassed. “Shut the fuck up,” I said, flipping him in the bird.

But Jack just laughed. “Sorry, it’s just, you two are really easy to make fun of. Your reactions are the best. If it makes you uncomfortable, I’ll try to reel it in, but I get bored easy and need something to take my mind off of my crippling loneliness. And you guys are cool, you know that? I was kind of worried that when I came to college, I wouldn’t find anyone to bond with, so it’s really awesome that we’re friends now, right?”

I blinked at him but didn’t answer.

“I think it’s awesome,” Jack continued.

That asshole talked for the _entire_ walk to our dorm building. It was annoying at first, but once I had zoned out and stopped listening to his words, his voice kind of became white noise.

And, by the time Tweek and I got back to our dorm room, I didn’t think I could stand one more second of Jack’s ramblings. He was a cool guy in small doses, when you could get him to shut up. But with extensive exposure, he kind of made me want to cut off my ears, van Gogh style, just to drown out his never-ending slightly raspy voice.

When the door closed behind us, Tweek looked up at me and said, “I want to take a break. I can’t think about Palermo right now, I’ll go insane, man!”

I wasn’t really planning on studying after class, mostly because I had spent almost two hours listening to my current least-favorite person talk about nothing. And I was faced with the daunting reality that I was going to be stuck listening to him talk incessantly for the rest of the semester, until I finally got out of his class. I definitely wanted a break. “Okay,” I agreed, slipping my bookbag up and over my shoulder and setting it on my bed. “Did you want to make your fort?”

Tweek let out a breath. “Not really,” he said hesitantly. “I kind of just want to . . . cuddle with you?” He hunched his shoulders and looked up at me from under his eyelashes, an adorable sheepish blush on his face.

I felt a goofy smile cross my lips, and I nodded happily, taking hold of his hand and tugging him gently over to my bed. “I’m up for some mid-day cuddling.”

Tweek did his little giggle-laugh and allowed me to pull him onto my bed. I wrapped an arm around his shoulder, gathering him into my side. He rested his head on my shoulder and hummed contentedly. 

“How’s your day going?” I asked, giving his upper arm absent-minded soft caresses. “Good?”

“Yeah,” Tweek said, nuzzling into me. “Good.”

We both fell silent for awhile, (or, a few seconds, whatever, it was always hard to gage time passage when it was just me and Tweek hanging out together), before Tweek lifted his head and said, “Ngh . . . you wanna do something? I’m bored.”

“Okay,” I said, leaning my head against the wall as I thought of something we could do to pass the time. “You wanna play Go Fish?”

I watched as Tweek made that face he always made when he was contemplating something. He quirked his lips to one side and tilted his head, and it was like watching a puppy contemplate how to respond to another puppy. “No,” Tweek said eventually. “Not in the mood for cards. Wanna binge TV?”

I mean, yeah, I was always up for nuzzling up to Tweek and mindlessly watching television, but I was more inclined to do something with my hands, to actually engage in an activity, rather than sit in one position and watch something. “No. Not in the mood.” I furrowed my eyebrows in thought.

“Oh!” Tweek exclaimed suddenly. “We can do this thing that Kenny and I used to do. Or, well, when I was staying at Kenny’s apartment, I watched Kenny and Stan do it, but it looked really fun!”

“Oh yeah?” I said. “What’s that?”

“NGH! They do this thing, where they play the weirdest songs on their phones, and whoever has the weirdest song wins.”

“What do they win?” I asked.

Tweek hesitated, like he didn’t actually know the answer and was wracking his brain to think of some plausible response. “Um. They win victory?”

I removed my arm from around his shoulder and turned to face him, chuckling at his answer. “They win victory, huh? Well let’s make it more interesting.”

Tweek grinned at me. “I like interesting.”

“We need to up the stakes,” I said, pulling my phone out of the front pocket of my jeans. “Make it so we actually win something. Otherwise it isn’t as exciting, right?”

“Right!” Tweek agreed giddily, straightening his posture excitedly. “Okay, so what’s the prize?”

“Blow job?” I asked with a shrug.

Tweek blushed, but shook his head. “Too cliche. Pays for the next dinner?”

I rolled my eyes. “Oh, a blow job is too cliche, but paying for dinner isn’t?”

“Well what else is there?!” he said, cheeks pink and miffed.

I glanced away thoughtfully. “Winner gets five bucks?”

“Okay, fine. Deal.”

We shook on it, and I asked, “Four out of seven?”

“Four out of seven” he agreed.

And so commenced our spontaneous game. We did a quick rock, paper, scissors game, (2/3, of course), and he won, the bastard, so he got to go first. We both pulled up our phone playlists and scrolled through our songs, preparing for the first round.

Tweek won the first round immediately. I hadn’t even played my song yet, and I conceded to his song.

“ _Detachable Penis_?” I asked, surprised and shocked that that was even a song, and that Tweek knew it, and liked it enough to have it on his phone.

Tweek did his little giggle-laugh and nodded. “You can’t go wrong with a song about dicks.”

I made a face. “I guess.”

“Okay, your turn,” he said, nodding at my phone. “Try to beat that.”

I decided not to acknowledge Tweek's accidental innuendo. And my song didn’t hold a candle to fucking . . . _Detachable Penis_ , but I clicked my choice anyway. The unmistakable sound of soft drum beats sounded in the room and I could tell by Tweek’s unimpressed expression that I . . . hadn’t impressed him.

“What the fuck, Craig, _I_ have this song,” Tweek said with an eye roll, showing me the screen of his phone.

I narrowed my eyes at him. “Fine. It’s not my fault I listen to normal songs, Tweek.” I flicked his forehead, giving him a smirk when he “GAH!”’d and jolted. “And you can’t go wrong with Toto,” I said defensively.

“I _guess_ , but it’s not weird,” Tweek said, shaking his head. “Africa is objectively the best song of the 80’s, you lose by a landslide.”

I grumbled, looking back at my phone irritably. I already knew that. “Yeah, I kind of figured.”

Tweek snorted, amused. “Because you failed so miserably, you can go first. Good luck, because I promise you’re going to lose again.”

“Well if it’s anything like fucking  _Detachable Penis_ , probably,” I said with an eyeroll. Why the fuck was Tweek so weird? And why was his taste for weird-as-all fuck music so cute?

Just another thing about him that I didn’t understand.

And my next song wasn’t all that weird, either. Because I -- understandably -- didn’t listen to weird music. It was M1A1, off of the first album of the greatest band in the universe, Gorillaz. Gorillaz always played half-weird music, so you could never go wrong with half of their songs.

Tweek tilted his head to the side, and then to the other side, as he contemplated just how weird the song was. “It’s . . . kind of weird, I guess?”

“Oh, come on!” I said, waving my hands in shock. “This song is so fucking weird!”

“It’s a solid 7.5.”

“I veto that, it’s _easily_ a 9.25.”

“Okay, _fine_. 8.66 repeated.”

I eyed him warily. “Fine.”

“Okay, my turn,” Tweek said, clicking his next song. I didn’t recognize it at first, but I could tell right away that it wasn’t the most normal song by today’s standard.

“What is this?”

“Tubthumping,” Tweek said smugly, like he knew he had won again. “Chumbawamba.”

So the band name and the song title alone automatically named him champion, and I was starting to get irritated that I was losing. And it wasn't like a narrow call, Tweek's music was infinitely weirder than mine, which made it seem like he rigged the game when he proposed it to me. “Ugh. Okay. I guess. And why do you like this song again, because it doesn’t really sound like all that great of a song.”

“Craig, you can’t go wrong with a song about being gay and proud. And it came out in the 90’s, so.” He said that like it was reason enough.

I scrunched up my face. “You peaked in the 90’s, didn’t you?”

“Well I wasn’t exactly alive for a whole lot of it,” duh, because I wasn’t either, “but the 90’s was the greatest decade in human history, and you cannot convince me otherwise, except maybe I’ll accept the 1770’s, because America, and also Beethoven.”

Ignoring Tweek’s unnecessary elaboration, I asked, “Why the fuck do you even have this song?”

“Because it’s a good fucking song, Craig!” Tweek exclaimed defensively. “Jesus Christ!”

Just as I was about to click my next song, my phone pinged, telling me I had a text. I was half worried it was Jack, even though that was irrational, because I -- wisely -- didn’t give Jack my phone number. I clicked the notification at the top of my phone and saw that it was from Nikiel.

 _Hey, baby boy, it was nice hanging out with you and sugar bear the other day! We should do it again sometime_.

I rolled my eyes at the offer, but then immediately got another message from him.

 _And I won’t make you two sit through another two hours of golf. Sorry about that, by the way, I was just really excited to have someone to hang out with_.

Jesus, he was so pathetic. And I don’t mean that in a rude way, it’s just I felt kind of bad for him. Because I actually liked his company, despite the fact that he could be so touchy feely sometimes. It was like with Clyde; I can’t handle being around someone that was that mushy. At least, not for long periods of time.

I showed the text message to Tweek to see how he felt about it. I expected him to look resigned to the inevitability of another afternoon with him, but after he’d read the text through a couple times, he got this look on his face, like he had just realized something. He averted his eyes thoughtfully, and I could tell he was working through something in his mind, so I let him gather his thoughts.

It took a few seconds, but eventually Tweek said slowly, “He needs a companion.”

I tilted my head. I had made that exact comment the day before, because it was true. Nikiel was very lonely, and he needed someone who saw him like I saw Tweek, someone who would be as excited to hang out with him and he was with them. Because as much I liked him, like I had said before, Nikiel was a little _much_.

“Yeah. Because he’s fucking lonely and won’t shut up about it,” I said flatly. That came out more blunt than I had meant it to, but I was sure Tweek got the point.

Tweek glanced up at me. “And who _else_ do we know that's lonely and won’t shut up about it?”

It took me a few seconds to understand what he was saying, but when I did, I felt like the biggest moron in history.

Jack.

How the _fuck_ did I not make that connection? I had connected them, and their perpetual loneliness, several times, but I had never once thought that maybe they’d do good to hang out with each other. Two lonely people being lonely together.

But they weren’t just two lonely people. They were two lonely, touch-starved gays, and that was something I could relate to.

I was never really touch-starved before I met Tweek. Or, I was touch-starved, but I didn’t realize it, because when Tweek hugged me that first time, sure, I thought about pushing him away, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. Because, deep deep down, I liked the feeling of having someone wrap their arms around me and squeeze me tight. And I had always trusted Tweek, (before that two-week stint in hell), so I knew he wasn’t taking advantage of me, or using my moment of unexpected vulnerability to make fun of me. Because if he was just gathering ammunition to make fun of me, then . . . fucking nope. I probably would’ve cut ties then and there, because I don’t fuck with that shit. It takes a lot to get me to smash some walls down, and I would’ve been _so fucking pissed_ if someone made fun of me for it.

But anyway. Hugging Tweek. 100%, would recommend, and _always_ would’ve.

So judging by the way Tweek was staring imploringly at me, I was getting the feeling he wanted to set the two of them up. He wasn’t subtle. So I started gathering counterpoints to every valid point he was about to make, because I just didn’t want to get involved. I didn’t usually play matchmaker, (read as: I had _never_ played matchmaker), mostly because I’ve never cared enough. It was their problem, their loneliness, and I didn’t want to interject myself in their struggle to find someone to love them. It seemed invasive and inappropriate.

But the more I thought about it, the more I realized. They were two of the most useless gays I’d ever met in my entire life. It was going to be difficult for them to find a partner, because Nikiel had difficulty reading situations, and Jack had difficulty . . . just being around people in general.

Bottom line. I liked Nikiel, and I liked Jack, (some of the time), and I figured that if Tweek and I got them together, we wouldn’t have to worry about them bugging us all the time. And that was the only reason I had that would motivate me enough to weasel my way into their personal lives.

Tweek hadn’t even said anything yet, but I let out a sigh and nodded. “Yeah, okay. Let’s set them up.”

* * *

I knocked on Jack’s dorm room door three times, as loudly as I could. I only had to wait maybe five seconds before the door opened, revealing a casual-faced Jack, a pair of headphones wrapped around his neck, one in his ear the other dangling in front of his chest.

He gave me his lopsided smile when he saw who it was. “Hey, Craig. What’s up?”

Before I could explain my business, I paused to rethink just the fuck I was doing. Did I really want to subject myself to extensive company with Jack, even if it was just to introduce him to Nikiel? I could seriously only take Jack in small doses; he had an overpowering personality, which isn’t necessarily a . . . bad thing. It was just hard to be around him sometimes, which was a thought that actually made me feel bad to have.

But that was the whole point. Because as annoyed as I was with Jack for being lonely, I had lost sight of the fact that . . . Jack was lonely. And I knew what being lonely was like, and it fucking sucked. I had the means to counter his loneliness, and, because I was an up-and-coming outstanding citizen, I was going to help him.

That, and it would’ve been awkward if Tweek helped him and I didn’t.

“You wanna come hang out with us?” I asked flatly, folding my arms over my chest and giving him a blank stare.

Jack grinned at me, and immediately stepped into the hallway, closing the door behind him. But before he could say anything, his eyes widened suddenly and he whipped around and stared at his closed door. “Oh, God _dammit_.” He let out a long sigh after a second and said, “I locked myself out again. And it’s only my first day back, I’ve _gotta_ stop doing that.”

I didn’t know how to help him, so I didn’t offer to and turned to head back to my dorm room.

“Whatever,” Jack eventually said, his voice indifferent. “I’ll just ask Karen at the front office. Won’t be the first time.”

Jack was probably the least cool person I’d ever met.

Back in my dorm room, I returned to my seat beside Tweek on his bed. He was still staring at the class syllabus for Palermo’s class, his eyes shaking and his head jerking to the side. He had the first reading book on his bed beside him and I had the feeling he was about to get a head start on fucking everything to avoid getting a bad grade. Fucking Tweek, of course he was going to overachieve.

Jack perched himself on top of the desk, (I blushed at the thought of what had transpired there the night before), and crossed his legs Indian style. “Okay, so this is going to sound really lame, but just hear me out. I was just rereading _Pride and Prejudice_ \-- I would pay literal money to make out with Mr. Darcy -- and I noticed something weird. I don’t know if you guys have ever read that book -- it’s fucking amazing, 9/10, would recommend -- _but_ there’s something I never understood about it, and I think I might’ve figured it out. Just tell me what you guys think --”

“Jack.”

Jack’s mouth snapped shut. He didn’t seem bothered by the fact that I had just cut him off. In fact, he looked kind of happy that one of us was engaging in conversation with him. “Yeah?”

I rolled my eyes at him. “Can you stop talking for like five seconds please?”

“Uh, sure?” Jack said, quirking his eyebrows in confusion. “What’s up?”

“Well, first of all, if you don’t stop talking, I’ll have nightmares of you yammering on about old books and making out with fictional characters,” I said flatly. “And second of all, Tweek and I have something to tell you.”

Jack smirked. “You’re tying the knot?”

My face exploded at how fucking unexpected that comment was. I could fucking feel my blush crawl down my neck, and, even in my most embarrassed state, that didn’t happen very often. I did not need that fucking image forced into my brain at that time of day, especially because Tweek and I had company and I couldn’t play it off as easily as I would’ve been able to if it was just Tweek and I.

“GAH! No we’re not!” Tweek exclaimed, dropping his head to his opened binder, narrowly missing the metal rings, and I could feel the heat radiating off of him, more pronounced than it had been before.

“That’s not -- _no_ ,” I agreed, shaking my head anxiously. “This is something for _you_. I’m actually being _nice_ , but if you’re going to keep being an asshole, you can forget about it --”

Jack rolled his eyes. “Alright, alright, fine, I’ll stop being an asshole. What’s going on?”

I shook my head irritably. I was almost starting to regret helping him, because in that moment, I was reminded just how much an asshole he could be. Ugh. People. “We know another lonely gay guy that might like you.”

Jack’s eyes widened, his mouth falling open slightly in surprise. My announcement was probably the furthest from his expectation; he was probably expecting something along the lines of being invited to hang out with our other friends or something. (Not that I thought he was ready to deal with _those_ assholes yet.) “Um. Oh. I, uh. Can’t say I was expecting that, really.”

“Yeah,” I said flatly, pulling my knees up to my chest. “His name’s Nikiel. He’s twenty-one, and is a waiter and a bartender. He’s nice, and he’s desperate. Are you interested?”

A very noticeable swallow traveled down Jack’s throat. I didn’t understand his reaction; he talked about being lonely all the time, I was giving him the opportunity to not be lonely, why was he getting all nervous?

“Yeah, I’m interested,” Jack said finally, chuckling awkwardly. “Really interested. But . . . well, is he gonna be interested in me? I’m really annoying.”

“Yes, you are,” I agreed with a nod. Jack’s face fell, so I backtracked and said, “But Nikiel is nice, and he won’t think you’re annoying. He talks a lot, like you do, but he’s also a great listener. When he wants to be.”

“GAH! Yeah!” Tweek said, glancing up from the book. “You guys will be great together.”

Jack looked somewhat relieved, but there was still this anxiety behind his eyes. And I just didn’t fucking get why.

“If you’re sure,” Jack said, taking a deep breath. “I’m just, uh. A little nervous, you know? I’ve been wanting a boyfriend for so long, and now that I might meet up with a guy that is also looking for a boyfriend, I’m just. Nervous.”

He did a terrible job at explaining himself, but I knew that if I asked him a question, it would take half an hour just to get him to stop talking, so I just accepted and moved on.

“Great,” I said in a monotone voice, grabbing my phone from my sweatshirt pocket and placing my phone over the sensor. I figured, might as well get the ball rolling as soon as possible so I could get myself out of the situation. I had a feeling I was going to hate the entire ordeal the entire step of the way, but I knew the fall-out was going to be better than the set-up. Like, much better. Once Tweek had planted the idea in my mind, I had no doubt that the two of them were going to latch onto each other like leeches. Sure, maybe part of it would have to do with their unabashed loneliness, but they had a surprising amount in common.

I went to my messages, and typed a quick,

_You going to be around today?_

Nikiel wasn’t exactly tied to his phone, (for a handsome twenty-one year old guy, he wasn’t all that tech-savvy, and still had a VCR, something I hadn’t seen in years), but it was close enough to him, and he was lonely enough, that he texted back fairly quickly, unless he was at work.

So my phone pinged his response not even two minutes later.

_Yeah, I’ve got the day off. Wanna come over? Bring sugar bear!_

I nodded, even though I was alone and he couldn’t see me.

 _Sure_ ,

I texted back simply. I tossed my phone onto my bed and looked up, catching Tweek’s reassuring smile directed at Jack. “He’s -- NGH! -- he’s a good guy, I promise. Really, really nice. I know it probably won’t help me just saying it, but you have nothing to be nervous about,” Tweek said empathetically. Tweek had too much empathy. Or the right amount for a person to have. Or more than the normal person, while still being an acceptable amount. I didn’t have a whole lot of empathy, so I didn’t know what was normal or not. All I knew was that Tweek’s ability to relate to people’s anxiety and react accordingly was one of my favorite things about him.

Jack shrugged, leaning against nothing and folding his arms over his chest. “Well it’s just he sounds awesome, and I want to impress him. But I don’t know how to impress anybody without looking like a total jackass.”

“Don’t try to impress him,” I said flatly.

“Yeah!” Tweek agreed. “Just be yourself.”

“If you want an actual relationship -- which I’m guessing you do, because you talk about being lonely all the fucking time -- then don’t bullshit him on the first impression. Because you’ll eventually slip up, and Nikiel will know you’ve been real-life catfishing him.”

“Yeah!” Tweek agreed again. “Nikiel’s not good at reading people, so whatever you show him is what he’ll believe.”

“Right,” I said with a nod. “So don’t fuck it up.”

Tweek sent me a dirty glare. “GAH! Craig! Don’t word it like that! You’ll just freak him out!”

“What?” I said. “How am I supposed to word it?”

“NGH! Not like _that_! If someone told me that right before I met you, I would’ve just run away!”

“Yeah, but I’ll be there to make sure he doesn’t run away,” I said gesturing with my head in Jack’s direction. “I’m not going to waste my afternoon dealing with someone who’s not ready to fucking say hi to someone.”

“If you don’t want to waste your afternoon, then don’t be a dick!” Tweek said.

“Seriously, are you sure you guys aren’t already married?” Jack said with a chuckle. He seemed considerably more at ease than he had been when Tweek and I had first invited him into our dorm room. Which was good because it was weird seeing him not annoying.

“Shut up,” I said, narrowing my eyes at him. And, just because I was sick of that conversation, I added, “Are we doing this or not?”

“What -- right now?” Jack asked, unfolding his arms again and running a hand through his disheveled hair.

“If you want to get it over with, then yeah, now,” I said, leaning against the edge of my bed and reaching towards one of my converse shoes, shoving my foot inside it.

“Oh. Okay,” Jack said, and, when I glanced up at him, he was nodding to himself like he was trying to convince himself that he was making a good decision. “Yeah. Now.”

I rolled my eyes. I mean, I could make fun of him as much as I wanted to, but if I were in his shoes, about to meet Tweek, (using the same analogy Tweek had just used), I would’ve been freaking the fuck out, too. If someone told the de-closeted Craig that he was about to meet a blonde-haired, coffee-guzzling, Red-Racer-loving, hazel-eyed, conspiracy-theory-nut, paranoid twink, I would’ve lost my fucking mind.

“You coming, babe?” I asked Tweek, pulling myself out of my mind. He was still half-distracted by our English book, so I kind of had a feeling that he was going to sit that one out.

Sure enough, Tweek shook his head. “That’s okay. I’d rather stay here and get a head start on all this _bullshit_.”

I snorted at his response. What an adorable asshole, Jesus Christ.

“Okay. I’ll be back later,” I answered. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I would’ve preferred to have Tweek’s company over going by myself, because I had a feeling I was going to be hardcore third-wheeling, and in all honesty, I was aware of the fact that I was putting myself in a shitty situation. But I also understood where Tweek was coming from. He was very clearly terrified of Palermo, and he was very attentive when it came to getting good grades. “I’ll read with you when I get back.”

Tweek smiled appreciatively at me. “Okay! Thanks, Craig.”

“Don’t mention it,” I said, pulling my coat on over my sweatshirt, patting my pocket to make sure my key was in there. When my phone and my key were both accounted for, I said to Tweek, “I’ll see you later, honey.”

“Yeah,” he said, giving me a smile. “And good luck, Jack!”

Jack let out a shaky breath and waved at Tweek, saying over his shoulder as he followed me outside, “Thanks, blondie.”

As Jack and I descending the stairs, I glanced at him and said, “It’s only about a ten, maybe fifteen minute walk.” I could tell he was nervous, (it didn’t take a fucking rocket scientist), and I wanted to keep him as calm as possible because I wasn’t in the mood to deal with him freaking out.

“Okay,” he answered. He didn’t elaborate, which wasn’t like him. Jack loved to talk, because, at the very least, he thought he was funny. Or at least personable, even if he was aware of how annoying he could be sometimes. Regardless, he just wanted to make people laugh, he wanted people to feel good, and, as a person that couldn’t be bothered either way, I guess I found it an admirable quality.

“Stop being nervous,” I said bluntly. “He’s probably the nicest person I know.”

Jack nodded, but he didn’t answer, which was weirder to me than anything else about the afternoon. Usually it took a fucking miracle to get him to shut up.

* * *

Even though it was just me coming over, and Nikiel was long past the desire to be polite to me, I didn’t have to worry about Nikiel’s apartment being messy. It was never messy, ever. He must’ve been an obsessive compulsive housekeeper in another life.

When I knocked on the door, it swung open almost immediately, revealing a bright-faced Nikiel. “Hey, Craig.”

“Nikiel,” I greeted flatly.

He didn't seem affected by the lack of enthusiasm in my response, and seemed to immediately realize that Tweek wasn’t with me. “No sugar bear?”

I shook my head. “He’s back in our dorm room studying. I brought some asshole that I thought you’d want to meet.”

Nikiel looked behind me curiously, and I took that as a hint that I should probably move out of the way so they could see each other. First impressions and all that. I expected him to think Jack was attractive -- it was one of the first thoughts that entered my brain -- but his eyes actually widened when he saw him. His gaze shifted downwards, like he was either sizing Jack up, or checking him out. Judging by the almost unnoticeable swallow, I kind of figured it was the latter.

His eyes flicked back up, and he smiled. Probably showing off the impossibly white teeth of his. “Hi.”

“Hi,” Jack said immediately. I was taken aback by the change in his tone. He always sounded so casual and confident, but, even from that one word, I could tell he was nervous. I knew he had been nervous before, but I didn’t know it’d be that bad. But it did make sense. Even though Nikiel didn’t make me nervous, I knew that he was handsome enough to make _someone_ nervous just by existing.

Jack thrust his hand out, his arm taut and his rolled-up sleeves falling down. Nikiel blinked a couple times, and glanced down at the offered hand. I could tell he was a little curious, a little surprised, at the proposition. Shaking hands wasn’t exactly practiced outside a formal setting. It was one of the many things that set Jack apart from most other guys.

Clasping Jack’s hand and shaking it a couple times, Nikiel looked back up. There was a long, silent pause. Nikiel and Jack just fucking stared at each other, their hands connected midair right next to me.

I started to get a little uncomfortable with the silence, so I cleared my throat and said, “Can we come in?”

“Oh!” Nikiel said, immediately dropping Jack’s hand. “Yeah, sorry. Come in, sure. Yeah.”

I let Jack go inside first, and then followed him promptly. I was kind of getting the feeling that I was going to hate whatever was about to happen, because I knew I’d feel like a third wheel, and I hated feeling like a third wheel. But I was determined to just . . . do it. I liked Jack. And I liked Nikiel. I figured they’d be . . . okay together. Besides, I was pretty stoked that they were both going to stop bitching about how lonely they were.

And even if I wasn’t doing it for Nikiel and Jack, I was doing it for Tweek, who was concerned enough with our friends’ lives to want to help them.

“You can sit down wherever,” Nikiel said. “Anywhere’s fine. And, uh. I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name.”

“I’m Jack,” Jack blurted out quickly.

Nikiel smiled. “It’s nice to meet you, Jack. I’m Nikiel.”

“I know.” Jack’s words were coming out short and quick, and it was kind of funny to watch. Especially because I was so used to him just rambling on about nothing. When Nikiel raised a questioning eyebrow, Jack said, “Craig, uh. He told me. About you.”

“All good things I hope?”

Jack looked awkward, like he didn’t know how to answer that, so I said, “I told him the untainted truth.”

Nikiel rolled his eyes. “Wouldn’t expect anything less from you, baby boy.”

Jack looked a little concerned at the pet name. But then Nikiel looked back over at him, an intrigued glimmer in his eyes, and I could by Jack’s slowly relaxing posture that he realized that Nikiel was just one of those people that called fucking everyone by a pet name.

I pushed past the both of them and sat down on the chair by the couch. I broke the ice, I guess, because the two of them started moving after me.

Jack sat himself down, pressing himself against the armrest of Nikiel’s couch, looking extremely awkward and uncomfortable. He was a tall-enough guy, and not really all that scrawny while not being all that fat, and he was containing himself to like 3/4 of a couch cushion. He looked like he wanted to die.

Nikiel sat down next to Jack the couch, as far away from Jack as possible, his body language almost identical to his equally gay counterpart.

I rolled my eyes at how fucking ridiculous they were being.

I leaned back in the chair and watched as they both shot awkward glances at each other, none of the ‘sly’ looks syncing until like a solid ten seconds of silent. Nikiel had caught Jack’s eye as Jack was staring him down, and Jack flushed bright red. It was a little harder to gauge how affected Nikiel was but the way he quirked his lips to the side in a weird, close-lipped half-smile, said that he was very flustered.

“What?” Nikiel asked awkwardly. “I have something on my face?”

“No,” Jack said, shaking his head. His cheeks were still pink, and his hands were shaking slightly as they fiddled with his sleeves. But he managed to slap on that standard lopsided smile on his face, which was the only sign that he wasn’t about to fucking melt into a puddle of nerves. “You’re just . . . _really_ hot.”

“Oh. Well, thank you,” Nikiel said with a laugh. He rubbed the back of his neck. “You’re not so bad yourself. Kurt.”

Jack rolled his eyes, bouncing one his legs. “Like I haven’t gotten _that_ a million and a half times.”

“Well you even dress like him,” Nikiel observed. “That _can’t_ be unintentional.”

“What can I say, we have similar tastes.”

“Speaking of, I like your _Metropolis_ t-shirt. I’ve seen that movie approximately one thousand times.”

Jack laughed, glancing down at his t-shirt as if he’d forgotten what it looked like. “It’s a good sci-fi movie. Not the best, but good.”

“I can roll with that. The best one, of course, is --”

“ _Alien_.” “ _Alien_.”

They both spoke at the same time, giving the same response, and they also seemed completely surprised. Like they hadn’t expected the same answer, and they both just fucking . . . stared at each other in complete awe. Kind of an over-reaction to having a similar taste in movie, even if that taste was total shit. Tweek and I agreed on a shit ton of things before we even became friends, but those two dickheads were acting like it was some grand act of fate, bringing them together.

It was absolutely disgusting.

I cleared my throat when the tension was getting too uncomfortable, and it jolted them out of whatever trance they had both entered. They both looked incredibly flustered, and Jack even jumped to his feet and asked, “Can I use your bathroom?”, his voice hoarse and nervous.

Nikiel nodded quickly and answered, “Through that door, down the hall. The, uh. The only door down there.”

Jack nodded, turned on his heels, and exited the room at a brisk walk. As soon as he had left the room, Nikiel immediately turned to me, an excited, starstruck expression on his face. “Baby boy, I think I’m in love.”

I rolled my eyes. “Gross.”

“I can never thank you enough for bringing me such an amazing human being --”

I groaned. I hated thanks, especially when I didn’t even do anything. “Don’t thank me, thank Tweek. It was his idea.”

“Definitely shoot a ‘thank you’ to my sugar bear. This is probably the best day of my life.”

I leaned back in the chair, folding my arms over my chest, and said, “That’s a little dramatic, isn’t it?”

“Put it into perspective,” Nikiel answered. “Remember when you first met Tweek?”

I averted my eyes thoughtfully. “I remember.”

“How did you feel?”

I didn’t even hesitate. “Irritated by how much noise he made.”

There was a beat of silence. “That can’t actually be what first ran through your head --”

“It was,” I said. “It definitely was. That, and he was scared of everything. I didn’t tell you that story, did I?”

Nikiel chuckled, reclining back on his couch and crossing one leg over his other. “Oh no, baby, you did. The time I invited you here and we got drunk together. You ranted about Tweek for a good hour straight, you had a lot to say. He was hiding under his bed, right? And I remember you distinctly mentioning how adorable he was.”

I frowned. “I didn’t think he was adorable. Not at _first_ , anyway.”

Nikiel snorted. “That’s not what drunk you said.”

“Well, drunk me’s an asshole,” I said, annoyed. “And besides, we’re not talking about me and Tweek.”

“Yeah, you’re right. He is _really_ hot.”

I raised an eyebrow. “I know he is, I _am_ dating him.”

Nikiel looked very confused for a few seconds, before he barked out a laugh. “No, dumbass, not Tweek,” he said, an amused smirk on his face. “I’m talking about Jack. You randomly brought me the hottest guy I’ve ever met, no offense --”

“None taken --”

“And I am very happy right in this moment.” Nikiel fell silent, a thoughtful expression on his face. “Do you think . . . if I asked him out, do you think he’d say yes?”

I was about to open my mouth to say, “Don’t fucking ask me,” when a different voice responded.

“Probably. Only if you ask nicely.”

Nikiel jolted in an almost comical way, whipping around to stare at a blushing Jack, leaning cooly against the wall by the doorway and fixing his lopsided smile in Nikiel’s direction. He looked like he’d been there for . . . longer than when he’d spoken up, and, judging by Nikiel’s body language, I think he realized that as well.

Nikiel recovered quickly, though, and asked, his voice laced with a chuckle, “Well that takes care of that then, doesn’t it?”

“Takes care of what?” Jack asked, rosy cheeks contracted in a smile.

Maybe I’m just a fucking moron, but I had no idea what he meant by that. But I luckily for him I guess, Nikiel grinned and said, “Alright, fair enough. So what do you say? You up for a date with me?”

He looked confident, to someone who didn’t know Nikiel very well. But I knew him. Maybe not for very long, but him and I had shared some . . . trying times. I knew that he was nervous. He was pretty good at hiding it, though.

Jack, on the other hand, was terrible at hiding his nervousness. He had his lopsided smile on his face, but it was shaky and awkwardly close-lipped, like he was trying too hard. And his face was red, and his arms were folded tightly over his chest, his hands gripping his sleeves. “Yeah. Okay. Sure. I’d, uh. I’d like that.”

“Good,” Nikiel said. There was an undeniable satisfaction in his voice. I didn’t think there was any question that Jack was going to say yes, and I think even Nikiel was distantly aware of how immediately they had connected with each other.

* * *

About ten minutes later, and picture me awkwardly sitting in the same position, trying to busy myself as Nikiel and Jack flapped their lips. I was third-wheeling them so fucking hard, I was aware of that, but I hadn’t quite figured out how to escape the situation.

“--But _then_ it turned out that she just wanted a gay best friend, and that was the only time I ever ditched someone else, instead of the other way around. I want friends, you know, sure. Desperately at this point. But not enough to downgrade myself to the ‘token gay friend’. I _do_ have self-respect.”

“You made the right choice,” Nikiel said with a nod. He seemed _much_ more wrapped up in Jack’s . . . _witty_ anecdote than I was. “You gotta avoid people like that. Find people who like you for you, not what they think you have to offer.”

“I wish someone had told me that sooner,” Jack said, shaking his head thoughtfully.

There was a brief lull into silence. Jack was looking around Nikiel’s apartment with a relaxed expression, (he seemed to have finally calmed down), probably soaking up how fucking clean it was. Although, Jack was a pretty neat guy himself.

But Nikiel on the other hand was checking Jack out something fierce, his eyes half-lidded and adoring, scanning the length of Jack’s body. He still seemed so fucking giddy, like he was a kid who’d found a new best friend. Or a lonely gay guy who had found another lonely gay guy that realized they had like a weird spiritual connection thing. I could tell that they were going to be an annoying couple. At least during the first six months. But probably longer.

“So what’s there to know about you?” Nikiel asked, finally breaking the silence. He casually reached an arm around the back of the couch. It gave the illusion that he was wrapping his arm around Jack, and I think Jack realized this, because his eyes brightened considerably and he shifted closer to him, saying happily,

“Not a whole lot. I don’t do a lot of exciting things. I just go to classes, irritate Tweek and Craig, and go to the bookstore.”

“Books?” Nikiel asked, intrigued that Jack had provided him with an open-ended subject to talk about. “Do you read a lot?”

Jack nodded excitedly. “Yeah! I read all the time, I’m always reading. I got this book the other day, _Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets to the Universe_. It’s technically for teenagers, but I was a teenager at one point so I decided it doesn’t matter and went for it anyway. It’s really good, really sad. And it’s gay. Not as gay as, say, _me_ , but still pretty gay.”

“Oh, see, I never really got into reading. I did a lot of it in high school, but I lost interest when it wasn’t shoved down my throat anymore. There are three books that I keep around that I read over and over again: _the Great Gatsby_ , _the Catcher in the Rye_ , and _1984_.” He hummed, before adding, “And, okay, so _maybe_ I have the Harry Potter series.”

“And _the Cursed Child_?” Jack asked. “Did you ever read that?”

Nikiel scrunched up his face. “Ugh, fuck no. I heard terrible things about it. Was it that bad?”

Jack rolled his eyes. “It was terrible. Don’t waste your time. They had the perfect opportunity to have a cute gay relationship between two lonely boys, and they ruined it.”

“That happens a lot, doesn’t it?”

“It happens all the time.”

“Takes the wind out of my sails.”

“Same. So you don’t read a lot?” Jack observed thoughtfully. “What do you do?”

“Oh, I love sports,” Nikiel said. “All of them. I was raised on sports, when I was in school, I breathed sports. I made Craig and Tweek sit through two hours of golf the other day.” He chuckled. “I feel kind of bad about that, they looked really bored.”

Nikiel glanced at me out of the corner of his eyes, and I shrugged in response. “Whatever.”

I guess that was enough talking to me, because Nikiel immediately turned back to Jack. “What about you? You like sports?”

Jack nodded again. “I like sports.”

“Oh, yeah? What kind of sports? You strike me as a football kind of guy.”

Jack rolled his eyes, pulling one of his knees up on the couch so that he was half-facing Nikiel. “Football’s okay, but I lean more towards hockey. I tried to play when I was younger, but I was really bad, I could barely stand up on the ice. Of course, my dad was also the coach, so he focused so much attention on me that it was _too_ much attention. I actually got worse the more I played, so I stopped after two years.”

Under normal circumstances, I would’ve dropped off the face of the earth if Jack started rambling about boring shit like his uneventful childhood. But Nikiel looked entranced, a smile on his face and a sparkle in his eyes. “Was hockey the only sport you played?”

Jack tilted his head in thought, averting his eyes and quirking his lips off to the side. “Eh, I tried my hand at football, and baseball, and soccer. And basketball. And lacrosse. And track and field. And even swimming at one point, but I was really bad at all of them so I gave up. I love watching sports, though.” He turned his eyes back to Nikiel and smiled. “Did you _really_ breath sports?”

“Oh, I was a _total_ jock in high school,” Nikiel said with a laugh. “Played all the sports and had all the popular friends.”

Jack raised an eyebrow. “Were you a dick? You don’t seem like a dick now. In fact, you seem like the opposite of a dick now, but were you a dick then?”

Nikiel shook his head. “Naw, I wasn’t a dick. I didn’t really care for the whole ‘making fun of unpopular kids’ thing. It just felt mean and unnecessary. Besides, I came out my junior year, and was immediately shunned by all of my quote-unquote _friends_. It was the theater kids, believe it or not, that took me in.”

Jack frowned. “That sucks that that happened to you. If it’s any consolation, my dad abandoned me and my mom when I came out.”

“That doesn’t console me even a little bit,” Nikiel said, giving Jack a frown. “That makes me feel worse. A nice guy like you, getting abandoned. I don’t like that at all.”

“I got over it,” Jack said with a shrug. “Happened years ago. He was a dick anyway.”

Nikiel’s frown lifted some, and he smiled. He reached over and held Jack’s hand, intertwining their fingers together. “Well it’s a good thing he’s out of your life then.”

Jack smiled back, his cheeks pink and his eyes happy. “And it’s a good thing you’re in mine.”

That inexplicable connection thing passed between their eyes again, and I decided I’d had enough of being a fly on the wall. It had already been awkward, but that moment officially marked the ‘Craig, get the fuck out here’ limit in my mind. “I’m just gonna head out, then,” I said, standing up and patting my pocket to make sure my phone was still in there.

“You’re leaving, baby boy?” Nikiel said, having successfully been snapped out of whatever the fuck he had been in. Jack still seemed pretty dazed at the fact that someone was able to keep up a conversation with him, and was just watching Nikiel out of the corner of his eye as he waited for Nikiel’s attention to go back to him again.

I nodded. “I’ve gotta get back to Tweek,” I said, coming up with a complete bullshit answer. Tweek was going to be pretty busy for the rest of the afternoon, and he was probably so deep in studying that he forgot he even had a boyfriend to begin with.

Jack’s eyes flicked over to me, a distant awareness in his eyes that also spoke gratitude. He knew that Tweek wasn’t waiting for me, so he knew that I was giving them some alone time. He didn’t say anything, though, just gave me a small nod and his lopsided smile. The message was received and I ignored him.

“Okay, well, say thanks again to my sugar bear,” Nikiel said. He didn’t look very disappointed that I was leaving, though, which was a first in all the time I’d known him. He didn’t even look indifferent, he looked somewhat excited, and that made me feel . . . good, I guess. That he was attaching himself to someone specific, and not just every person he came across.

For the first time in a long time, the prospect of someone else’s happiness, (aside from Tweek’s, who must always be considered an outlier), made a smile pick at my lips.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're wondering, "Detachable Penis" is a song by King Missile and it is WEIRD.


	27. The Return of a Familiar Face

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I am 100% positive that the ending is extremely OOC, but I wanted to give you guys some fluff, for you will need it in the coming days.

I didn’t hurry back to my dorm room, but I also didn’t take any detours. It was a surprisingly nice day for the beginning of January. It was still cold as fucking hell, but the sun was shining enough for me to be able to enjoy my Monday afternoon stroll.

The staircases of my dorm building were empty, which meant I didn’t have to deal with those awkward grimace-smiles that people liked to send my direction in place of a pleasantry. I never knew how to respond to that, and I was already pretty people’d-out, so I didn’t want to have to deal with it.

As I neared my door, I heard a shit ton of commotion in my dorm room, and I hadn’t even pulled my key from my pocket. There were two distinct voices, one of them obviously belonging to Tweek, and the other sounded suspiciously like Clyde, even though I wasn’t entirely sure why Clyde would be visiting Tweek. There was still some tension between the two of them, which I was a little disappointed by, but it seemed to be getting better with time.

I put my key in the lock, not trying particularly hard to disguise my entry, but when the door opened, the two of them were in a conversation deep enough that they didn’t notice me.

Clyde was pacing back and forth, his voice quick and anxious when he spoke. “Oh my God, Tweek, what do I do?”

“GAH! You --” Tweek started. He was sitting on the edge of his bed, looking uncomfortable and anxious, his hands gripping the front of his shirt.

Clyde talked right over him. “I’m not good at making people feel better, I _try_ to be good at making people feel better, but it’s hard sometimes, and I --”

“GAH! _Clyde_ ,” Tweek interrupted loudly, standing up and walking over to Clyde, gripping Clyde’s upper arms and shaking him. “Deep breaths, Clyde!”

Clyde nodded quickly, but his breaths were not deep in the slightest. Even from across the room, I could see his chest rising and falling quickly.

“I know it’s hard, but you need to calm yourself,” Tweek said, a stern, yet caring, expression taking over that anxious expression from before. “Token needs you right now. He needs a friend, someone who won’t judge him. I don’t know Token very well, so I can’t tell you exactly what to do, but I can tell you this: see what Token needs from you and go from there. If he needs space, tell him you’ll be there for him if he needs you and leave it at that. If he needs company, stay with him, but _don’t_ talk about it, just ask if he’s doing okay, and that’s it. If he wants to talk about it, don’t judge him, don’t interrupt him, and don’t offer advice if he doesn’t ask for it. But before all that, you need to calm down.”

“Calm down,” Clyde said absently, his breaths steading under Tweek’s grounding stare. “Calm down, yeah.”

“Good,” Tweek said, releasing Clyde and taking a step back. “Where’s Token right now?”

“Um,” Clyde said, his cheeks flushing as he stared guiltily at the floor. “I . . . don’t know.”

I guess that meant something really bad, because Tweek’s eyes widened and his mouth fell open. “ _You don’t know?!_ ” he screeched, his composure crumpling rapidly. “Wha -- how do you not know?!”

“I don’t know!” Clyde answered, his voice picking up his anxiety right where it left off. “When I heard the news, I panicked and left!”

“ _You panicked and you left him?!_ ” Tweek yelled, gripping the front of his shirt and twisting harshly. “Oh, Jesus, Clyde, why’d you _do_ that?!”

“I didn’t mean to!” Clyde wailed, pacing nervously around the room. “Token hardly ever gets sad, and when I saw him freeze up like that, I freaked out, I didn’t know what to do!”

“That doesn’t mean you _leave_ him!” Tweek answered, starting the pace the room in random circles.

They were quite the pair to look at, both freaking out next to each other. I didn’t know what the fuck they were talking about, it just seemed really serious. But even though it seemed really serious, the way they were behaving around each other was . . . fuck, it was a little funny, I mean can you blame me? I didn’t see the two of them interacting hardly ever. Or ever ever at all. They never really had the opportunity to hang out for long periods of time outside of the entire group of guys, and their stark similarities in the face of conflict was blaring in that moment.

And Tweek’s advice? That was amazing. I didn’t think I could offer advice even half as accurate. I was surprised they hadn’t seen me yet, although they both seemed too wrapped up in their freak-out to notice much.

“We have to find him!” Tweek shouted, hurrying over to his bed and grabbing his coat, starting to slip his arms into the holes. He turned towards me -- or, more accurately, the door -- about ready to yank his shoes on and bolt, when he finally saw me. He jumped, shrieking loudly and dropping his coat, nearly tripping over his own feet.

“GAH! _Craig_! You scared me!” he shouted at me, bending over and picking up his coat again.

“Sorry, Tweek,” I said. “But, um. What’s going on?”

Clyde groaned, running a tired, anxious hand down his face. “Nichole’s in town. She transferred from Plymouth.”

Ah. That made sense. I had only heard a Nicole reference once, and it didn’t go over well. It was almost like she had died, that’s how people had treated her moving away. It wasn’t a topic that was often breached, because just her name seemed to throw Token off his groove. It really illustrated how much Token had liked her, and how he hadn’t gotten over her even a little bit. It was obvious he didn’t even try.

So I could understand why Nichole suddenly showing up was such a concern; it must’ve cut open an already-fresh wound. So. Not good.

“Is Token okay?” I asked.

“No, Token’s not okay!” Clyde said loudly. “I have tried for literally _years_ to get Token to move on from that girl, and nothing has worked! When Nicole dropped the bomb that she was moving across the country and didn’t want to tie Token down with a long-distance relationship, it ruined him! And he never got over it! And now she’s back!”

“Okay, first of all, stop yelling,” I said flatly. “That’s not going to help anything. And second of all, Tweek’s right, you’ve gotta calm down. This isn’t your problem, this is Token’s problem, so don’t make it about you.”

Clyde took a few long breaths, running a hand down his face. I didn’t really know why he was freaking out so much; it wasn’t like seeing Nicole was terrible for Clyde, the whole thing was all about Token! Clyde shouldn’t have taken anything personally. “I was gonna come to you for advice, but thank God Tweek was here,” Clyde said, with a groan. “He was a whole lot more help than you would’ve been.”

Even though that was an insult, I knew it was 100% right, so I couldn’t get too mad about it. “That's fair,” I said with a shrug. “So what’s the plan?”

“The _plan_ is to go find Token!” Tweek insisted, his coat already completely on, and his shaky fingers trying to align the zipper at the bottom.

“Right, so let’s go!” Clyde agreed, taking a few steps towards the door.

I took a side-step, blocking the exit with my body. “Maybe I should go,” I said. “By myself.” My voice left no room for argument, but, of course, that’s exactly what I got from Clyde.

“What? No!” he protested, attempting to push past me.

I held an arm out to stop him. “Clyde, you’re freaking out. And Tweek, you’re _also_ freaking out. And, like Tweek said before, Token doesn’t need to be around people that are freaking out. He needs someone who’s calm. And I am currently the only calm one out of the three of us, so I’ll go alone, and report back later.”

Tweek let out a breath, resigning to the fact that I was right. He seemed a little disappointed, and like he wanted to help more than he already had, but I knew that he knew that he was prone to panicking at the drop of a hat. He unintentionally made things about him a lot, and I knew he was aware of this, and I knew he didn’t like that part of himself, the part that accidentally garnered a shit ton of attention. And the entire situation _needed_ to be about Token.

Clyde, on the other hand, wasn’t in agreement. “No! I’m fine! I’m calm! See?” Clyde took a long, deep breath, and tried to relax his face. It didn’t even remotely work, and it just looked like he had painful constipation. If I wasn’t convinced that Clyde didn’t have complete control of his emotions, that right there did the trick.

“I don’t believe you,” I said, shaking my head. He opened his mouth to argue, so I said, “You know yourself better than anybody. Do you really trust yourself to stay calm the entire time?”

A very determined expression came to Clyde’s face, but I spoke before he could answer.

“The _entire_ time? Even if it takes hours? Even if Token cries?”

Clyde seemed much more hesitant.

“Even if he wants to do something completely reckless that is obviously a bad idea? Even if he loses control of his emotions and he yells at you?”

Clyde seemed even more hesitant than before.

“Even if --”

“Okay, okay,” Clyde said irritably, miserably. “I get it. You’re . . . ugh, right. I guess.”

I knew I was, but I also knew that the situation was too sensitive for me to tell him that. “Good,” I agreed, turning back to the door. “Stay here and keep your phones on you. I’ll text you guys later.”

Because I didn’t want to search all over the campus for Token, as I was walking down the stairs, I sent him a text asking him where he was. Yet another reason it was a good thing I was going alone, because Clyde didn’t want to do anything over text; he was willing to scour the campus up and down looking for him, and I just didn’t have the patience for that. I got a text back almost immediately, saying,

_Is Clyde with you?_

Another good reason I was going alone.

_No. Just me._

Token responded,

_I’m in this little coffee shop, across the street from Harbucks._

I knew where the Harbucks was, so I knew I could figure out the rest, too.

_Do you want company?_

I texted, and then Token answered,

_If it’s just you, sure._

I nodded at nothing, pocketed my phone, and then headed off in Token’s direction.

* * *

The small coffee shop was pretty small. There were about ten tables in total, and pictures of various cat portraits on the wall. A small man was behind the counter. He had a thick head of no hair, dark eyebrows, a friendly smile, and a name tag that said _Fenton_.

“Weeeelcome to _Fenton’s_ ,” he greeted cheerily in a heavy Swedish accent. I gave him an awkward smile, but didn’t respond. I surveyed the coffee shop and quickly honed in on Token, sitting at a table towards the back of the shop, almost completely hidden by this awkward protruding wall. He was by himself, a cup of coffee on the table in front of him, and his backpack on the floor beside him. He was scrolling through his phone expressionlessly, most likely ignoring Clyde’s mountain of texts no doubt going his way. I walked over to him, and sat down quietly, waiting for Token to say something.

It took a second. “Hey, Craig.”

“Hey.”

It was a long time before Token said anything else, and it wasn’t exactly profound. “So, how’s it going? How’s Tweek?”

I shrugged. “Tweek’s good. Studying. He’s really freaked out about Palermo.”

“Oh, yeah. I had him last semester,” Token said absently. “He sucks.”

“We have him for reading comprehension, and I already hate him.”

“He gets worse.”

“He seems like the type of person to get worse the more you know them.”

Token hummed distantly, swirling his coffee around in circles. There was a long stretch of silence, before Token broke it again. “How’s Clyde?”

I pondered how to answer that without going into too many details. I settled on an extremely vague, “Totally freaking out.”

Token took a deep breath. “I know. I’ve gotten seventeen texts from him in the past twenty minutes, and half of them I can hardly read.”

“Doesn’t surprise me.”

“I love him like a brother,” Token continued, shaking his head. “But he doesn’t handle conflict very well. And I don’t think I can be around him right now.” It sounded harsh, but it made sense. Token was sad. And, as sure as Clyde was that he was the best person to help Token, it was obvious that Token agreed with me in that Clyde had a personality that clashed with sympathy. He had a shit ton of empathy, (almost as much as Tweek), but he lacked the ability to separate himself from other people when other people were sad. If he saw sadness, then he was sad, too. It was a good quality some of the time, but not in that particular moment.

“I can understand that,” I said with a nod. “How’re you doing?”

Token shrugged. “Okay. I guess.” That was a lie, so I stayed quiet until Token felt the need to tell the truth. “I mean, fuck, I’m not okay,” he said, his voice strained. “I just . . . I was in _love_ with her, you know? We’d been dating for six years, and everything was going fantastic. I couldn’t have been happier than I already was, then she comes over to my house one weekend and says that her parents are moving up to Vermont because they want to get into the sugaring business. So I said, oh, that’s horrible, I won’t get to see you, but at least the reception might be okay and we can still talk as much as we can. I was _determined_ to make it work, I didn’t want to lose her.

“But then she says that she wants to break up, because she doesn’t want me stuck in a relationship with a girl I might never see in person for a long time.”

That sounded like it sucked, it really did. I felt for Token, a lot. “Do you still love her?”

Token leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table and running a hand down his face. “So much it hurts,” he mumbled. “I can’t even look at her.”

“Did she talk to you?”

“She said ‘hi’, but that was it.”

“What did you say?”

Token sighed deeply, a slight whine coming from the back of his throat like he was embarrassed by what he had done. “I said ‘hi’ back and then got the fuck out of there.”

I stared at Token, my lips quirked anxiously. I wanted to comfort him, but I didn’t know how. “Would you want to get back together with her?”

Token was quiet for awhile. For so long that I didn’t think he was ever going to answer. But then Token said, “I want to, but I don’t know if I can. Because I don’t know how much she’s changed, or if she’s changed at all, and I’m a little nervous to find out.”

“You should just suck it up and try anyway,” I said, my voice too blunt for the situation. And that was when I remembered Tweek’s words from earlier that day, about how I tended to verbally arrange so-called comforts in an offending way. “I mean, right now you’re prolonging what’ll probably happen anyway, right?”

“I . . . guess so.”

“Right,” I nodded. “So you should get it out of the way while you have the nerve. The more you put it off, the harder it’ll eventually be.”

Token pinched the bridge of his nose and groaned. I had never seen him that sincerely distressed before. Clyde was right; it was a little unsettling. I imagine that was how it felt for them to see me so fucked up before. “I know. I know I should just get the fuck over it. It’s just. Hard.”

“I know it’s hard,” I said. “It’s not going to be easy. But it’ll be okay. We’re all here for you.”

At my words, Token glanced over at me. “You’re surprisingly rational right now.”

I was always rational. I didn’t like not being rational, because it went against everything I knew. I was comfortable around rational thinking. But I knew what he meant. He meant I was actually responding to a crisis more eloquently than I ever would’ve been able to before. I shrugged. “I’ve gotten better at people. Just in general.”

“I’ve noticed.” He observed me quietly for a few seconds before adding, “You know, Tweek’s good for you. You’re not as much of a dick as you used to be.”

I wasn’t used to Token calling me a dick, (insults like that were more up Clyde and Jimmy’s alley), but he did have a point. “Thanks,” I said flatly.

“It’s nice,” Token said, giving me a small smile. “You seem happy.”

“I am,” I answered. I didn’t mean to sound like a smug dick; I _was_ aware that Token was under distress, but I knew he didn’t want to be around someone who was going to make the entire conversation about him and Nichole, so I tried to keep it as normal as possible.

And that was how the two of us started talking about whatever came up. We started, of course, by shit-talking Clyde, just because it was an easy topic, and we both knew that neither of us meant it seriously. And we talked about the shitty teachers we’d had up until that point, exams and midterms, assignments, all that shit. But school is a boring topic, so we started up with movies, and TV shows, and music. He still didn’t understand why I liked Gorillaz so much, and I still didn’t understand why he liked Daft Punk so much, but we both met in the middle ground with Queen and Nine Inch Nails.

It was kind of nice catching up with Token, despite the circumstances. I made a mental note to hang out with him more.

* * *

I eventually hit that moment of ‘okay, done with people’, and I could feel it in my chest. And I had also come to conclusion that, sure, Token was sad, but he was on the right track. He was going to be okay, so I didn’t feel bad leaving him alone in a coffee shop.

“What do you need?” I asked, as a kind of alert, telling him I was about ready to leave. “Do you even need anything?”

Token was quiet, drumming his fingers on the table absently. I observed his forlorn expression; he didn’t really look any better than when I had first seen him; he had given me a few smiles throughout our conversation, and there was a grateful smile in his eyes at the normalcy that I pointedly provided for him. But I wasn’t sure if my presence did anything. Probably not, considering I wasn’t exactly the most comforting person.

“I just want to be alone for now,” he said with a sigh. He glanced up at me and gave me a tired smile. “But thanks for hanging out with me.”

I just shrugged and stood up. “If you need anything, don’t hesitate to go to Tweek,” I said, grinning when Token huffed a laugh. “He’s good with people.”

“Thanks,” Token said, rolling his eyes.

“I’ll see you later,” I said over my shoulder, making my way to the front door. “Text me if you need someone to talk shit about Clyde with.” I assumed Token laughed, but I was already on the sidewalk, pulling my phone out of my pocket. I almost didn’t want to text Clyde, because I wasn’t in the mood to deal with him, (my day had already proven to be way too fucking long already, and the last thing I fucking wanted was to appease a panicked Clyde), but I found Clyde’s name in my contacts anyway.

 _Coming back now_ , I texted him, rolling my eyes when I immediately got a rapid succession of texts, probably asking how our chat went. But I ignored all of them, (because I was, you know, coming back, and I didn’t want to have to explain everything twice), and went to Tweek’s name instead. (Although he wasn’t Tweek, he was “Honey”.) I sent him a message that said,

 _Please make sure Clyde doesn’t have a heart attack or dig a hole in our floor from pacing too hard_.

Tweek’s response was,

 _I’ll try, but he’s still kind of off the deep end_.

That was about what I expected, but I at least wanted proof that I tried.

* * *

“How is he?” Clyde insisted the second the door was open. He had been pacing rapid circles, and I could tell by the furrow-eyebrowed expression on Tweek’s face, from his perch on his bed, that he was getting extremely annoyed.

“He’s --” I tried, but Clyde talked right the fuck over me.

“You weren’t gone for long enough!” he said, putting his hands on his hips and glaring at me. “Are you sure you did everything right, does he know we’re all here for him and that we want him to be happy?”

I rolled my eyes, folding my arms over my chest. “Yes, I’m sure.”

“Okay,” Clyde said reluctantly, like he didn’t believe me. He took a long breath, but he did not look like he was calming down at all. “Tell me what happened, and be totally 100% honest.”

I had no fucking clue why Clyde thought there was a single reason for me to lie about Token’s well being, (unless Token explicitly told me to hide certain things, in which Clyde was shit out of luck), but I decided to blame his hysteria on hysteria and move on.

“He’s doing okay,” I answered, moving past Clyde and sitting next to Tweek on his bed. “He’s going through a tough time, but he’s trying to be okay.”

“Does that mean he’s okay?” Clyde demanded, resuming his pacing. “That doesn’t sound healthy, are you _sure_ he doesn’t need me to --”

“He doesn’t need you to do anything,” I said firmly. “He’s coping, and he doesn’t need anyone interrupting.”

“But --”

“Clyde, don’t.”

“I’m just worried --”

I rolled my eyes again. What a fucking puppy. “I know you are.”

“Are you sure --”

“I’m sure.”

And I fucking kid you not, Clyde and I went back and forth like that for five minutes, just him trying to talk around logic, and me correcting him. I was almost tempted to just kick him out, but I knew that if he was anywhere out of my line of vision, he was going to go straight to Token, despite us telling him not to. And, keeping this in mind, Tweek and I agreed to let Clyde stay in our dorm room for the rest of the afternoon, mostly because we knew the alternative.

* * *

Fucking finally, Clyde left for dinner at the cafeteria, and he assured us he was calm enough to be cordial around Token. I only half believed him, but I was eager for him to leave, (wanting to just be alone with Tweek for the rest of the night), so I waved him goodbye and gave him one final warning not to jump the gun.

* * *

Later that night, I found myself sitting on Tweek’s bed, a copy of _1984_ in my lap, as Tweek and I took turns reading paragraphs out loud. With every word, my inclination to blow my fucking head off increased ever so slightly, to the point where I was seconds away from imminent death.

“ _Already! He sat as still as a mouse, in the futile hope that whoever it was might go away after a single attempt. But no, the knocking was repeated. The worst thing at all would be to delay. His heart was thumping like a drum, but his face, from long habit, was probably expressionless. He got up and moved heavily towards the door._ ”

“Okay, I have to stop,” I announced the second I finished the paragraph aloud, dropping backwards onto my pillow and rubbing at my eyes. Why the fuck did the font size have to be so fucking small? The book was already so wordy, (fucking . . . fucking George Orwell and his fucking Big Brother is Watching You shit, and ughhhh), what was the point in having such tiny letters? It was just adding insult to injury.

But maybe my over-involvement in other people’s affairs had just put me in a bad mood, and my thoughts were more salty than normal.

“We only read the first chapter,” Tweek said tiredly, but he flopped down next to me, the book falling closed on his stomach.

“And that’s one chapter too many,” I said, turning my head and pushing my forehead into his shoulder. “Can we take a break? We can finish the reading later, I just . . . _ugh_ , you know?”

The majority of my bad mood melted when I felt Tweek lift my hat just enough to kiss my hairline. I smiled, but kept my head where it was because I liked the attention. “Thank you for reading with me,” he said sheepishly, in that adorably hesitant, almost broken voice that he always used when he was vaguely apologetic and majorly appreciative about something.

I sighed happily. “I know you like getting ahead in classes, you obnoxiously smart asshole. And besides, it’s probably good to be prepared with the dickhead teacher we have right now.”

“Oh, Jesus, don’t remind me,” Tweek groaned, awkwardly bringing his arm around my body so that I was pressed into his side. Surprisingly, that was the first time that had happened. Usually I had him under _my_ arm, or pressed into _my_ side. Mostly because it felt good having him there, and he never complained. But it felt nice to just be held like that. So, in response, I did what Tweek usually did that always made me smile: I turned on my side and wrapped an arm around his waist, resting my cheek on his shoulder.

I was so fucking comfortable. He was so warm, and just being surrounded by that warmth was a really comforting thing. It was like being wrapped in a giant blanket that was jittering slightly and smelled like coffee.  

I probably could’ve fallen asleep, easily. But we were only together like that for a few seconds before I heard my fucking phone ping, and I huffed angrily. Because no fucking way was I going to even look at who wanted to try to talk to me. Whatever it was, it could wait.

“Are you going to get that? It could be Token,” Tweek said, his voice content and insinuating that he really wasn’t bothered if I moved, as long as it was for the sake of our friends, and as long as I came back.

But that did make sense. I did say that I was going to be there for Token if he needed me, and chances were he was going to text me before he texted Clyde, just because he knew that my reaction to whatever happened wouldn’t have been as dramatic. And I’ve already explained why, but I’ll just sum it up for you really fast: Clyde’s a pussy.

I lifted myself up and reached behind me to grab my phone which was sitting on my bedside table. I held my finger over the sensor and went to my messages.

So it wasn’t from Token, but it was from Nikiel. Go fucking figure. Like I hadn’t gotten enough of that asshole for a fucking lifetime.

It was a picture message, and I scrunched up my nose at the sight. It was a selfie of Nikiel and Jack, but Nikiel had leaned over and kissed Jack’s cheek at the last second, and the shocked expression on Jack’s face was . . . okay, amusing I guess. His eyes were wide, his mouth slightly open, and, had the picture been taken a few seconds later, his entire face would definitely be red. And the text beneath the picture said,

 _Guess who’s got a booooyfrieeend_........

Follow by approximately a thousand heart emojis.

I groaned, and placed my phone upside down on my bedside table, immediately falling back down on my back. “We need to stop interfering with other people’s love lives, it’s really taking a toll on my desire to ignore everyone.”

“But -- ngh -- don’t you feel good helping people?” Tweek asked, pushing himself up so he was propped upright on his elbow. I didn’t feel like moving so I just watched him from my place sprawled out on his mattress. “Gives you a sense of purpose, right?”

I shrugged, which felt a little weird, considering I was laying down. “I don’t need other people to give me a sense of purpose.”

Tweek furrowed his eyebrows, like he couldn’t understand my reasoning. For someone with so much empathy, he wasn’t usually as adept at following other people’s logic. “Why not?”

“Because I don’t need a sense of purpose. I don’t think there’s a grand scheme that I’m a part of; I don’t believe in destiny. Without destiny, you can’t really have a sense of purpose, can you?”

“Yes you can!” Tweek answered emphatically. “You don’t need faith to have direction.” With a grunt, Tweek added, “Let’s try this. What is your biggest goal in life?”

“Live fast, die young.”

“I’m being serious, Craig.”

A little disappointed that I hadn’t made him laugh, I averted my eyes to the ceiling and thought about how to answer his question. To be honest, I hadn’t really ever thought about my purpose in life because, as I’d already said, I didn’t think I’d ever have one. It just wasn’t something I found all that important. So it took me a little while to hash out my thoughts.

My goals before I got my shit somewhat together were blurry to say the least. I was so . . . distraught and angsty in high school that I barely thought past how much alcohol I had before I needed to go back to Travis’. I didn’t think about things in the long run, which typically wasn’t like me, but I hated everything about life in high school. I just couldn’t bother to concern myself with long-term goals.

I guess, once I had started thinking about it, my plans in high school were to get a job working for NASA. Fucking anything, as long as it was space, because, (besides weed, alcohol, Red Racer and guinea pigs), space was the only thing that I could draw some levels of happiness from. But beyond a career, I was planning on getting married and settling down. It was a distant thought, and was based more on what I observed from other people, and less of what I actually wanted. A wife, a dog, a house in the suburbs, that was really what I pictured my future to look like. And, because I wasn’t interested in getting clean or being healthy as a teenager, finding happiness wasn’t a big priority, either. Numbing my mind, however, was; as in, forgetting the present and forcing myself into an unreality.

I didn’t want to die, but I didn’t want to live. At least, not in the way that I was living. I just didn’t know how to stop, (not because of any violent addiction, but because I was unfamiliar with what it was like to exist outside of the self-destruction I had gotten used to). And at the same time, I didn’t want to stop, because the alternative wasn’t exactly all that tempting. It was bleak, and involved me having no friends, (meaning I didn’t have that stress outlet that I used to have), and living in a town that I didn’t like.

Once I had reached this conclusion, I turned my head to look back at Tweek. I was happy to see him watching me carefully, patiently awaiting my answer.

“Before I met you? To try to forget myself.”

Tweek frowned deeply, and his eyes quirked in the same way they did when he was sad. I didn’t like the expression on him, it didn’t look right. He scooched towards me and put a hand to my heart, leaning down some so that he wasn’t propped up all the way, but wasn’t completely laying down. He opened his mouth to say something, but I talked over him.

“And after I met you?” I continued, “To make myself into someone that deserves to be remembered.”

Tweek’s frown immediately reversed and he beamed at me. He even let out short little giggles and I grinned up at him.

“As if I could forget _you_!” Tweek said happily. “Even before we really got along, when we first met each other, because whether you realize it or not, Craig Tucker, you’re special.” He hummed softly, sliding his hand up so that it was cupping my cheek, his eyes fixed to my mouth as he spoke. “It’s your eyes, I think, you know, the way you look at people, and also because they’re, like, neon blue. And it’s also probably because you do this thing where you don’t care, and I think a lot of people would probably want to be able to do that, because it makes certain things more bearable.”

I didn’t know what to say to that, I could feel my face fucking radiating heat and I didn’t trust my voice just yet.

Tweek’s eyes flicked up to mine after a few seconds and he added, “But you do care, you just don’t show it. You’d make a good president.”

When it came to Tweek, that was a surprisingly meaningful compliment, and it made my heart skip a beat. Tweek was always so skeptical about his presidents, so for him to tell me that I’d make a good one, in the face of forty-something terrible ones, (it was difficult to tell if the goods every president did outweighed the bad), was so nice to hear.

“Thanks, honey,” I said, feeling myself go a little half-lidded. “You’d make a good vice president. My cute little Dick Cheney.”

“Shut up, I am _not_ George Bush!” Tweek exclaimed, frowning indignantly at me. “And besides, fuck that, _I’ll_ be the president! You can be my secretary, and we can hold hands at press conferences, and we can fuck in the Oval Office.”

I could feel my entire face heat up, and I felt inclined to tell him to go fuck himself. But what stopped me was his face; it had turned pink only a few seconds after he’d suggested we fuck in the president’s office at the White House, which means he hadn’t totally set out to say that, which I found both extremely funny and extremely adorable. I jumped on the opportunity to make fun of him. “That a fantasy of yours?”

Tweek’s eyes widened, and he pulled away from me. “ _GAH! No_!” he said too quickly, his head jerking to the side.

No way was I showing mercy that quickly. “Are you sure?” I asked, sitting up slowly and inching my way towards him. He stared at me with wide eyes and flaming cheeks. “I can’t promise I can make that happen, but we can make this room our own personal Oval Office. Want me to find a pair of glasses and call you Mr. President?”

“ERGH! _Shut up, Craig!_ ”

“Would you like me to cancel your lunch plans, Mr. President?”

“ _Jesus Christ!_ ”

“The missile launch code is 420-69, Mr. President,” I said, biting my bottom lip to keep from laughing when Tweek slid his hands up his burning cheeks and buried his fingers in his hair.

“GAH! I’m am going to _kill_ you!”

“I’ll be waiting for you under your desk, Mr. President --”

With an embarrassed shriek, Tweek launched himself towards me, slapping a hand over my mouth and glaring daggers at me. I tried to stop my laughter, but I just couldn’t fucking help it, his face was all red and his heart was pounding in his chest. He was so fucking adorable, seriously, what the fuck.

I blinked up at him, still chuckling behind his hand, and raised an eyebrow.

“ _Idon’twanttotalkaboutit_ ,” he rushed out, quirking his lips to the side.

Once I controlled my laughter sufficiently, (meaning I was going to be able to speak coherently), I gripped Tweek’s wrist and gently removed his hand from my face. “You should feel comfortable talking about things like this with me. Just so you know, I’m not going to judge you --”

“You were just making fun of me!”

I smirked. “That’s because you’re adorable when you’re mad.” He bared his teeth, but I rolled my eyes, and took his arm, wrapping it around my body again. Fuck off was I going to ask him to cuddle me, so I figured I’d just kind of coax him in the right direction. And, even though he still looked disgruntled, he wrapped his arms around me anyway. “Seriously, though. If that’s something you’re . . . into,” I cleared my throat awkwardly, “We can discuss it, if you want. When we do eventually take that next step. It’ll be good if we’re both on the same page.”

Tweek grumbled, settling back down and resting his cheek on the top of my head. “I don’t want you to call me Mr. President.”

I smiled and gently kissed his neck. “Then I won’t.”

“Just call me Tweek,” he added, drumming his fingers on my waist, “Because it’s my name, and, even though I know it’s kind of a terrible name, I don’t think I could answer to anything else --”

“Honey,” I interrupted.

Tweek hummed and asked, “Yeah?”

“So I can call you honey,” I observed, nuzzling my nose into the crook of his neck when he giggled.

“You already do!” he said, snaking his hand underneath my hat and carding his fingers through my hair.

“So babe’s in too?”

“It was never out.”

“What about coffee bean?” I asked, lifting my head and scooching up some so that we were face to face, leaning forwards and nuzzling our noses. He giggled, and I could feel his warm breath on my face, and I felt myself go half-lidded, that familiar affection for him stirring in my chest. He was smiling so wide I almost couldn’t see his hazel eyes, his cheeks crinkling the skin around them too much. I felt the sudden urge to just be really fucking out of character, and spray him with the bubbling affection that jump-started my heart, because I’d had a long, exhausting day dealing with other people’s shit, and Tweek’s little giggle-laughs always made me feel better. And, I’ll go out and fucking say it, I was feeling . . . playful, I guess. I was, at the very least, willing to go that extra mile just to keep the smile on Tweek’s face.

“Sweetheart? Darling? Princess?” I continued with a chuckle. When he giggled some more, I gave him a quick peck on the lips, and then gave him another one just for good measure, and then maybe another one just because he kept on giggling and it was really fucking adorable. “Cutie pie? Dollface? Pumpkin?”

“ _Pumpkin_?!” he said, laughing happily, draping an arm over my waist and cuddling close to me.

“Yeah, pumpkin. Like the . . . gourd?” I said, my statement turning to a question when I realized that had no fucking clue what a pumpkin actually qualified as. “I don’t fucking know.”

Tweek slowly came down from his giggles, (which I purposely didn’t make easy by peppering kisses all over his blushing face), and when he finally did, he let out a little sigh and said, “You seem extra happy.”

Usually when someone drew attention to any kind of emotion that I might’ve been feeling, I would shut down, but in that moment, when Tweek directed both of our attentions to the wide grin on my face, I couldn’t let my spirits wither. “I feel extra happy,” I said, planting another kiss on his lips.

Maybe it _was_ just the honeymoon phase, and maybe it _would_ end eventually. But _fuck_ did it feel nice, and I was planning on basking in it for as long as possible.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you liked the chapter, despite the sudden character alteration at the end. (I promise, it's only temporary, I just really wanted to write some fluff.)
> 
> Please comment, tell me what you think! I'm curious to see what you guys think about the lovesick Craig at the end. I know it's not canon, (the closest we get, really, is these random quotes from him, ["You're capable of more than you think"], and that's all I can think of right now), so I'm sorry about that! I try to be as canon as possible, I swear!!


	28. Could You BE Less Subtle?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry about the short chapter, there'll be another update probably today, and at the very latest, tomorrow morning. And, like the past few chapters, it is one of those 'necessary evil' chapters, so I'm sorry about that.
> 
> But anyway, I hope you like it! Please leave a comment and tell me what you think!

Turned out Token wasn’t the kind of person to run to someone else when he needed help, because I didn’t hear from him at all, (save for the simple, “Yeah, I’m good”, texts in response to my own texts asking how he was doing). I did see him though; he was going about his business as usual, and he even looked like he was okay. I mean, he looked a little awkward if he was in the same room as Nichole, and stared at her too often for it to be just spacing out, but he seemed to be coping well enough on his own.

It wasn’t until the tail end of January that there was a solid conclusion to Token’s . . . _thrilling_ love life. In my opinion, as worried as I was, it was a pretty mundane problem. I’d seen how the two of them acted around each other, and they were both very obviously still into each other. One of them would break down eventually, it was only a matter of time.

* * *

It was a Wednesday, so Tweek and I had Palermo. (We were cursed with having class with that asshole twice a week.) He had assigned a shit-ton of tedious, nit-picky homework, as usual, and I was dreading having to do it with my overachieving, but also really fucking smart, boyfriend.

Tweek and I were walking back to our dorm room after class, having said our goodbyes to Jack. Sidenote: Jack had gotten somehow worse after getting together with Nikiel. Like, he wouldn’t hang around us as often, but as he was leaving the English building, he kept saying, “Sorry I can’t walk with you guys today, I’m going to my boyfriend’s apartment. He invited me over so we could go on a date, because we’re boyfriends now.”

What a smug asshole. A happy smug asshole, but a smug asshole nevertheless.  

So after that dickhead was gone, I tried to get away from Stan and Kenny, because they were Stan and Kenny and I didn’t want to hang out with them, but before Tweek and I could get very far, we were promptly intercepted.

“Everyone’s going to our apartment,” Kenny said, gesturing with his head in the direction of their building. “Just to hang out. You guys wanna come?”

I opened my mouth to answer, but Kenny rolled his eyes and tacked on, “Let me rephrase that. Tweek. You want to come hang out us?”

Okay, so fuck Kenny, because he knew Tweek was going to say yes, and he knew that if Tweek said yes, I was going to go, too. Yeah, fuck him and his foresight.

“NGH! Yeah, okay,” Tweek said simply.

Yeah. Okay.

* * *

So that was how I found myself sitting next to Tweek on the loveseat in Stan and Kenny’s living room, finished with their company and wanting to die.

Cartman was doing the most Cartman thing ever, and had somehow procured a giant white board, and was drawing the plan of some elaborate scheme involving driving around to find stranded drivers on the side of the road with cars that had broken down. And their brilliant plan was to help them, and charge them money, and it was the most backwards, complicated, asshole-y way to earn a buck, and I couldn’t understand why they thought it was a good idea. They would probably lose profit from having to pay gas money.

Kenny was manning an armchair, his legs thrown over the arm of it, and scrolling through his phone, sipping at a glass of chocolate milk, and contributing to the conversation sparsely. When he was making fun of someone, Kenny was surprisingly quiet and reserved. And he’d always been that way, too. Unless he had something important or irritating to say, he was usually content to just watch conversations play out.  

Nichole, Bebe, Clyde, and Token were squished onto one couch, all looking fairly uncomfortable at the tight squeeze. With the girls there, too, there wasn’t a whole lot of room for everyone.

“We’re going to need jumper cables,” Stan was saying, scrolling through some article on his phone.

“Where’re we gonna get jumper cables?” Clyde asked, folding his arms over his chest.

“Forget that, how’re we going to _afford_ jumper cables?” Kyle asked. Ever the logician, if my sarcasm translates through text-format.

“Token, duh,” Cartman said, nodding in Token’s direction.

Token didn’t answer, but I was too busy not wanting to be involved in the conversation to really think about it.

“Token?” Stan said, looking up from his phone with quirked eyebrows.

There was another beat of silence.

“Dude, _Token_ ,” Kyle repeated, his voice louder and more commanding.  

I decided to tune in, because Token wasn’t usually that spacey and out of it. He was usually much more focused, more so than the rest of us, And, even though I was only really half paying attention to their conversation, I was starting to get a little concerned, so I glanced over at Token to see just what the fuck he was doing.

He was staring at Nichole. I shouldn’t have been surprised, he’d been doing that a lot. But it wasn’t your normal staring, it was that kind of half-lidded, adoring, lovesick staring that only someone that had it really bad was capable of. The kind I could only relate to after I’d met Tweek.

“Wake up, Token,” Clyde said, shoving at Token’s shoulder harshly. “Stop spacing out. This is important.”

Token blinked a few times, and, even though it was hard to tell, he was very obviously blushing. He wrenched his eyes away from Nichole and looked over at Clyde, rubbing at the back of his neck sheepishly. “Uh. What?”

“Okay, that’s it,” Nichole said, standing up abruptly and reaching over Bebe and Clyde over to where Token was sat, wide-eyed and open-mouthed. “I’ve had enough of this.” She seized Token’s hand, pulled him to his feet, and dragged him towards the front door. He followed after her like a confused puppy, his hand a fish in hers.

“Hey! Where’re you guys going?” Clyde called out to them. “We still have to --”

He was cut short when Bebe punched him lightly on the shoulder and hissed, “Will you knock it off, Clyde? They’re in the middle of something!”

Clyde looked confused, but he also seemed a little pleased with the abrupt physical contact with Bebe, so he calmed down a little and relaxed into the slightly-disgusting used couch. I then watched in minor disgust as Clyde glanced at Bebe out of the corner of his eye and ‘confidently’ wrapped an arm around her shoulder, but she nudged him away with an eye roll and a smile. Clyde just laughed quietly, his face lighting up like a moron.

Gross. Everyone was so gross.

Before anyone could say anything regarding their shitty excuse for a plan, Kenny announced abruptly, clicking his phone screen black, “Okay, you guys, it’s settled! Butters is coming to visit next month!” He looked around the room excitedly, like he was expecting everyone to be just as happy by the news as he clearly was.

“And we should care because?” Cartman asked, stepping back from the whiteboard, putting one hand to his hip and the other to his mouth as he contemplated the logistics of the complicated diagram he’d drawn.

“Because he’s going to spend another week here, and it’s going to be amazing!” Kenny exclaimed happily. He got that smile that he got whenever he talked about Butters; the half-lidded one, with the goofy grin and the pinkened cheeks.

Gross. Why was everyone so fucking gross all the time?

 

About half an hour after Nichole dragged Token somewhere else to . . . I don't know, _hash out their feelings_ or whatever, Tweek had fallen quiet. Quieter than he usually was around the guys. I raised an eyebrow, and leaned towards him, muttering so only he could hear,

“You okay, honey?”

Tweek shook his head rapidly, like he was shaking himself from his thoughts, and he glanced at me out of the corner of his eye and nodded emphatically. “GAH! Yeah, fine!” And then, in less than explanatory terms, he excused himself to get a cup of coffee. I was a little worried by the response, but I was also a little amused at the fact that he had just left to get coffee in someone else’s house without asking first. He was just gonna go for it. A total little brother move.

I agreed and tilted my head as I watched him leave. I had never really had the opportunity to check him out, mostly because I assumed I already knew what he looked like, but damn, I didn’t realize how great his ass looked in jeans. I’d never really had the best angle; I knew his ass _felt_ great in jeans, but that was about it. The only other time I watched him walk away from me was when he was heading to his gate at the airport, and my mind wasn’t exactly thinking about his ass. And, sure, maybe it was kind of a bad time to think about my boyfriend’s ass in a room full of people that jumped on reasons to rip on each other on a constant basis, but it was more a subconscious thing than something I was aware of.

“Wow, Craig, could you _be_ less subtle.”

I blinked and looked over towards the voice, only to be met with an amused grin on Clyde’s face. I felt my cheeks heat up but I ignored it and said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Don’t pretend like you weren’t just totally checking Tweek out,” he said with a laugh.

I rolled my eyes, ignoring my increasingly reddening face. “He’s my boyfriend. Sue me.”

“You know, I’ve been meaning to tell you, it looks like everything’s going well,” Kenny said, an obnoxious smirk on his face. His words sounded sincere, but he looked like he was making fun of me. I wasn’t entirely sure what to make of that.

Wanting nothing more than the attention to shift away from me, I just said simply, “Yes, everything’s going well.”

And I mean _very_ well. I couldn’t have been happier. But I didn’t dare say that in front of them, or they would literally never let me live it down. Those assholes had the memories of some animal that has really good memories, they were incapable of forgetting an embarrassing moment.

“You two look happy,” Kyle said thoughtfully. “And you’re smiling, like, a lot more than I thought you could.”

I shrugged, but didn’t answer. What the fuck was I supposed to say to that?

“Yeah, dude, it’s so weird seeing you like . . . _like_ someone,” Stan said, reclining back on his couch. “I didn’t think you had feelings.”

Okay, ouch. I knew that the guys saw me as an asshole, but I most definitely did have feelings. I always did. I just didn’t show it. Jesus, Stan was such a dickhole.

“I think it’s sweet!” Wendy said happily, putting a hand on her boyfriend’s forearm. “Don’t you, Stan?”

Stan looked over at her and the flat expression on his face softened and he smiled goofily. “Yeah. Sweet.”

Gross. Everyone was so fucking _gross_ , seriously.

Just then, Tweek walked in, a cup of steaming coffee wrapped in his pale fingers. All attention was on him, and he stopped in the middle of the room, his wide eyes flicking around to every person that was staring at him, (so everyone), a look of panic on his face. “GAH! What are you all looking at!” he screeched, his head jerking to the side.

“Craig was checking out your ass when you left the room,” Clyde said, an obnoxiously smug smile on his stupid face.

Tweek turned to me, his eyes somehow even wider and his cheeks flaming. I shrugged as I met his gaze sheepishly, because I was really fucking embarrassed to be outed like that.

“NGH! Oh, God! Why the fuck would you _do_ that?!” he shrieked, looking absolutely horrified.

“For obvious reasons that I don’t want to get into right now,” I explained vaguely. Which was a true statement, I wasn’t really in the mood to tell him he had a hot ass in front of the guys. I wasn’t Kenny. Or Cartman. Or a drunk Kyle.

But it was true. My adorable boyfriend had a killer caboose, in the most blunt terms. Maybe I’d get around to telling him that, but, when he sat down beside me, that look of continued panic on his face, mixed with someone more subdued, I wrapped an arm around him and tugged him into my side.

Okay, so maybe Tweek and I were a little gross, too. But it was okay when it was us, because it was us.

 

Later on in the afternoon, everybody got a collective text from Token that just said,

_We’re dating again_

With no further details. Most people in the room didn’t really care, because of how expected it was, but Wendy, Bebe, and Clyde all got very excited. The asshole quartet didn’t care too much, although Kenny did say, a smile on his face,

“Nice.”

But that was about it.

Tweek had a small smile, and even I felt just a little proud of Token for getting over his fear of Nichole in general.

However, I was aware of the fact that they had the potential to be gross, too, and then everybody that was in the room was going to be gross, and I couldn’t fucking handle that.

* * *

“Why don’t you ever take off your hat?”

I looked up from my laptop at Tweek, who was studying me carefully from his place at the head of my bed. He was reclined against the headboard, his notebook propped up in his lap so I couldn’t see it. He said he wanted some space, while still being close, so I was a little ways down on my bed, scrolling through various Creepypastas, trying to distract my mind from the fact that Tweek was right there and wouldn’t let me touch him.

I raised an eyebrow. “Because I like my hat.”

Tweek tilted his head thoughtfully. “Just for tonight, can you take it off?”

“Why?”

He shrugged, tapping his pencil on the top of his notebook. “Because I like your hair. I hardly ever get to see it, and the times I do get to see it, I’m . . . distracted by other things.” His cheeks turned a light pink and I smirked. Yeah. Distracted. “But, uh. It can be for just tonight!”

I gave him a smile. I didn’t see anything wrong with taking my hat off. Just around him, though. I was really fucking attached my to hat. So I reached up and pulled it off by the yellow poofball. I ran my fingers through my hair, because my constant wearing of it gave me probably the worst hat hair of all time. I gave myself a mental note that I should probably get my haircut soon. It was starting to get a little shaggy, and I hoped that I wasn’t starting to look like Stan, who thought that having the postscript Bieber haircut actually looked good on him.

I was interrupted from my thoughts when Tweek said, “Jesus Christ, you are so hot.” I glanced at him with flushed cheeks, surprised by his sudden compliment. But fuck, my blush I didn’t even remotely compare to the completely scarlet color of Tweek’s face.

“Thanks, honey,” I said, ignoring his temporary ‘don’t touch me’ rule by patting his knee. “You’re hot, too.”

Tweek cleared his throat, and, clearly embarrassed, turned back to his notebook, a satisfied smile on his face as he moved his pencil back and forth.  

 

We sat together for awhile, just doing our own thing. At one point, I heard a yawn consume Tweek’s entire being, and I looked over at him, just in time to see his jaw unhinged, his nostrils flared, and his eyes squeezed shut tight. And so began the thirty minute timer.

“Tired?” I asked him.

He let out a sigh and nodded. He made a few final strokes into his notebook, almost like they were an afterthought. Stupidly, I was intrigued. How I didn’t think about the fact that Tweek was doing his drawing thing so close to me, I don’t know. And his confession from forever ago returned to the front of my mind: he had a habit of drawing me when I was stationary, doing something mundane and insignificant.

I smiled to myself, and asked, leaning towards him and trying to peek into his opened notebook, “Can I see?”

With a shriek, he snapped it closed and gathered it protectively to his chest. “GAH! _No_ , you can’t see! Jesus Christ, that is _way_ too much pressure --”

I watched him for a few seconds before smirking. “Are you drawing me? Is that why you wanted my hat off?”

His face turned pink again, and he buried the fingers of one hand into his hair. His knuckles weren’t white, so he wasn’t tugging too tight, so that was good. He was probably just mildly embarrassed. But mild embarrassment still looked really adorable on him. “I’m going to need a lock on my notebook now, aren’t I?”

I rolled my eyes, reaching over to him and tugging on a lock of his hair. He grunted and shot me a glare, which I promptly ignored. “I’m not going to invade your privacy like that, asshole. This might surprise you, but I _do_ have morals.”

“ _I_ know that,” he said, relaxing slightly at my reassurance. “But you’re also kind of an asshole.”

I snorted. “Kind of?”

“Okay so you’re a huge asshole, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t like you.”

With a chuckle, I closed my laptop and leaned over the edge of my bed, carefully putting it on my horizontally resting bookbag for safe keeping. While I did this, I said over my shoulder, “I know you like me. You’re not very good at hiding it.”

“I’m not very good at hiding anything,” he responded.

“That’s not true.” I crawled towards him, maneuvering my body so that I was laying down beside him. “I didn’t know you liked me until you yelled it at me. And even then it took a couple times for me to understand.”

“That’s because you’re stupid sometimes,” Tweek said with a shrug. I frowned at him, because I was already a little self-conscious about my lack of social skills and I didn’t appreciate him commenting on it at all, let alone making fun of me for it. But I was appeased ever so slightly when Tweek pressed a kiss to my forehead. He reached over me, laying his notebook on my bedside table and laid down beside me, turning on his side so that he was facing me. “But that’s okay, I’m sure you weren’t expecting it. I know you have trouble reading situations sometimes, and you get nervous when people like you, because you don’t understand why people like you when you’re an asshole. Or, when you think you’re an asshole. Because you’re really not an asshole _all_ the time.”

Consider me officially appeased, for some reason. He was still kind of insulting me, but I understood what he meant, and I appreciated it. So I mirrored his body language, dropping an arm over his waist, and smiled at him. “Thanks, I guess,” I said.

“Yeah, dude, you’re welcome,” he said with a smile.

I gave his back gentle caresses and said, “How was your day, honey?”

I was expecting a rush of words from Tweek, explaining in great detail how he felt about Palermo, how happy he was about Token getting together with the girl he was absolutely in love with, something. But all I got was,

“Good.”

I furrowed my eyebrows, confused. Tweek wasn’t known for his attempted laconic approach to conversation. So, in order to prompt more dialogue, I brushed my fingers through his hair and said, “I’m happy Token’s happy.”

“Yeah,” Tweek said softly, closing his eyes and letting out a deep breath. “What time is it?”

I raised an eyebrow at his response. Tweek was usually happier at other people’s happiness than I thought myself even capable of. It was that empathy thing. So why he was so subdued about it confused me. I clicked the screen of my phone on. “About 11:45. Why?”

He groaned, his eyes slipping closed, before opening again, like he was fighting the oncoming sleep. “I just want to sleep.”

Hmm. That was a weird thing for my Tweek to say. But my Tweek was really weird already, so I wasn’t too fazed by it. “I’m surprised you’re tired,” I commented offhandedly. “It’s not even midnight.”

Tweek was quiet for a moment. “Palermo kills me,” was all he said as an explanation.

It was a weird statement, but I guess it made sense. Palermo was one of those people that just sucked the life out of everyone around him. And, because he was Tweek, he was especially nervous around him. “Yeah, I can see that,” I answered.

“You want to go to sleep?” I asked him.

He hummed and nodded, an overpowering yawn making his body go momentarily stiff, before he fell limp against me.

I was wide awake, so, after I shut the lamp off, I popped some headphones into my ear and went onto YouTube to find something interesting and mind-numbing to watch. Tweek had wrapped an arm around my waist, and pressed his face into my chest, so I had free range of one of my arms.

It took a couple YouTube videos for me to be sure that Tweek was sleeping. His breath had evened out, his chest rising and falling evenly.

But he was weirdly still. Tweek always moved around. Like _always_. I’m pretty sure he wasn’t capable of sitting still, even when he was sleeping, he just always had too much pent up energy that he needed to get out somehow. But he was essentially dead weight on my chest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know this drags on. Believe me, I know. But I promise, (like, sincerely promise), that it picks up again next chapter.


	29. I Hate February

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so this is going up sooner than I thought. 
> 
> (Also, to avoid confusion, this chapter takes place January-February of 2018. This should explain the importance of Wednesday-to-Thursday.)
> 
> (Also also: TRIGGER WARNING: There is a scene towards the end regarding past trauma, and at first I didn't think it was believable enough to put a trigger warning, but I've been informed that it made one of my readers recall a past experience. Please stay safe!)

Maybe I’ve mentioned this before, but I liked watching Tweek sleep. And it was better now that we were sleeping in the same bed and I didn’t have to get out of from under the blanket just to see him. I could wrap an arm around his waist and bask in the feeling of his perpetual warmth under my touch, and I could study him without feeling like a total creep. And it was the domestic moments like that that really made me realize how lucky I was to have him, and how surreal it felt to be so happy.

But, as much as I wanted to stay in bed with him forever, we did have class. Which was fucking stupid, but, even if I did want to skip, Tweek would be extremely pissed at me if I let him oversleep, so I whispered in his ear, “ _Tweek_.” I stroked his waist to try to gently wake him up. He didn’t even squirm, which was weird, because, even though Tweek was a heavy sleeper, he typically moved around a lot, and mumbled nonsense every once in awhile. But he was very still, very quiet, the same as he was the entire night.

“Tweek,” I said, my voice louder and my jostling more firm. “Wake up.”

Again, nothing. Silence, no movement. The only thing that indicated that he was still alive was his chest, rising and falling rhythmically.

I pulled myself up into a sitting position, picked up my pillow, and whapped him on the head. That seemed to be a trademark of ours whenever waking each other up, mostly because of how effective it was. He jerked upright, his face alight with surprise and fear.

“I tried. Twice,” I said, finding amusement in his startled expression.

The startled expression didn’t morph into that sarcastic, eye-roll-y face that I was used to. It just fell blank and he averted his eyes. It was a weird reaction to my words. I’d said those words almost every morning because of how fucking hard it was to wake him up, but usually he reacted . . . somewhat positively, I guess. He came around eventually, is what I mean. But he had never just shut off like that.

I frowned. “You okay? Bad dream?”

I mean, that _could’ve_ been it. It was a possibility But the thing is, Tweek never slept through nightmares; he’d had a couple since the day I met him, and he always woke the fuck up quickly and loudly. And he would’ve told me if he had a nightmare. Tweek was big into dream analysis, and he always wanted an ear to listen to his ramblings on what the symbolism of hotels in a dream could mean.

In response, Tweek just shrugged, and didn’t say anything.

“Um. Okay. Well, uh . . .” I wasn’t entirely sure what to say. “Well, I guess we should get dressed. Want me to make you some coffee?”

But Tweek just shrugged again, and clambered over top of me, stretching himself to his feet. I watched with quirked eyebrows as he stalked almost robotically across the room and started prepping his coffee maker. He seemed less jittery than usual. You’d think that was a good thing, but it was replaced with this weird . . . compliance, I guess, is the right word. Like, it was almost like apathy, but not the respectable kind.

It really looked like he had completely shut down, and the  more I watched him, the less of Tweek I saw in the way he moved, and in the fact that he didn’t make a single noise.

I tried to engage him in conversation as I walked him to his probability and statistics class, but he never answered me. He barely grunted in response to anything I was saying, and it seemed more of an afterthought than anything else. I even steered all conversation to things that I knew he loved to talk about, like the Roswell UFO incident, and the ‘suspicious’ connection between Lincoln and Kennedy’s assassination, and mothman, but nothing stuck.

I stopped him just before he could walk into the math building. “Are you sure you’re okay?” I thought that was a logical question: Tweek had never explicitly said he _was_ okay -- he actually hadn’t said anything at all -- so my statement was a little totally incorrect, but I just wanted to hear a verbal response. Tweek was an awful liar, so even if he said he was okay, I’d know immediately that he wasn’t. And if he actually was, I’d know. And if he gave me a reason as to why he wasn’t, I would have a better idea how to make him feel better.

But all he said was,

“I just really hate February,”

And then he pushed into the math building.

I watched him go with quirked eyebrows. I was confused. I had woken him up, and he hardly gave me a good morning. That was weird for several reasons. Tweek was never really a morning person, but I usually got _some_ reaction out of him. And, even if that reaction was him just yelling at me, he eventually got over it, and grinned at me and rolled his eyes and called me an asshole.

But even after he was fully awake, and after he consumed four cups of coffee, he hardly spared me a smile.

I mean, it wasn’t like he was wrong, about the whole February thing. I agreed with him; February is the worst month of the year. It’s this mess of gross half the time, and a flurry of random blizzards the other half. I, personally, could do without February, and, unless your birthday is in that month, I think most people agree with me. July is second, because it is nauseatingly hot then, but nothing will ever top February.

It didn’t really explain why Tweek was suddenly in a slump. _Nothing_ explained why Tweek was suddenly in a slump. Everything was going great, I thought. Our relationship was as strong as ever, we’d been hanging out with the guys more often, and he told me that his lowest grade was a high B, and that was only because he’d accidentally read the wrong chapter. He hadn’t heard from his parents since holiday break. I didn’t know what to make of his sadness; not only could I not find a source on my own, but he didn’t give me any clues. He didn’t tell me anything, he barely spoke to me that whole morning.

I didn’t know what to make of it, I was lost.

* * *

Whenever I showed up to pick Tweek up, he always smiled, at least a little bit. Pretty much since the beginning of me walking him to and from classes, he was always noticeably happy to see me. With some contextual exceptions, but, ignoring the weirdness of that morning, everything had been going pretty good.

So when I caught Tweek’s eye, I wasn’t expecting a totally blank expression staring back at me. I frowned again. I’d been doing that a lot that day.

I walked over to him as he adjusted the textbooks in his arms, and we met halfway. I held a hand out to him, hoping that he would take it, and letting out a breath when he did. “Hey, Tweek,” I greeted. “How was class?”

Tweek just shrugged, that same flat look on his face.

We started walking back to our dorm building in horribly awkward silence. He was holding fast to my hand, squeezing to the point where it was almost uncomfortable, but not entirely unpleasant. With Tweek, I liked being close to him, so I wasn’t complaining. It was out of the ordinary, though; Tweek and I were a pretty touchy couple when we weren’t in the company of other people, (walking outside together was the exception), but it was more casual. Like a,

“Hey, wanna hold hands?”

“Sure,”

Thing.

It wasn’t really all that desperate, like it was in that moment. And it wasn’t like we were doing anything _momentous_ ; it was a Thursday in February, and class had just ended, and we were walking back to our dorm room. Nothing really something to freak out over, but Tweek was clutching to me like a lifeline.

“You okay?” I asked again, for the third time that day. “You’re kind of cutting off my circulation.”

I was actually expecting Tweek to let me go, but he just shook his head and kept his tight hold. “Sorry,” was all he said.

“It’s okay,” I said slowly. I felt more gentle than I normally did. Even though Tweek hadn’t really confirmed that something was wrong, I had an uneasiness in my gut. I felt like I was talking to an excitable animal. I felt like that around Tweek sometimes, because, even though I knew I had a pretty good grasp on Tweek’s personality and responses to certain situations, there were times that I just wasn’t sure. But that desire to comfort him had never been more vague and ambiguous. “I’m just a little worried worried, you know. You’re acting kind of weird.”

“Not any weirder than normal,” he answered, his voice flat and even.

“Yes weirder than normal,” I responded with a frown. “You want to talk about something?”

“Nothing to talk about.”

“. . . Are you sure?”

Tweek glanced over at me, a sharp, hyper-awareness in his eyes that wasn’t usually there. “Do you want it in writing?” he said, a bite to his words.

I stared at him. That answer came entirely from left field, and I didn’t know what to say. His whole ‘fuck you’ attitude had come from absolutely nowhere; like, the night before, everything had been normal. Maybe he was . . . quieter than normal, I guess, but other than that, he laughed with me and giggled when I teased him and curled himself around my body when we had gone to sleep. There was nothing between those lines that could explain his sudden descent into anger.

And I didn’t know what to do.

* * *

Tweek and I both had morning classes on Fridays.

By the time we’d left our dorm room, Tweek’s mood hadn’t changed in the slightest. It hadn’t gotten any better, and it hadn’t gotten any worse. He didn’t talk to me on the way to class, he didn’t talk to me on the way back from class, and he receded to his side of the dorm room as soon as I’d shut the door.

Tweek had tossed his textbooks on his bed, shucked off his coat, kicked off his shoes, and tucked himself into the furthest corner of his mattress. He pulled his notebook out from under his pillow, and flipped it open, pausing in thought before drawing what I assumed to be was a straight line.

I started to flip through my government textbook, although my attention was entirely on him. I watched him intently. His face was blank, he knees pulled up to his chest, his notebook against his thighs and he was drawing almost robotically. Like he was either thinking too hard about what he was doing, or just sketching absently, like his mind was somewhere else.

“How’s your day going, honey?” I asked softly, so I didn’t startle him.

He glanced up at me, and, even though I didn’t think he meant it, there was a sharpness to his gaze. He looked away almost immediately. “Okay.”

There was a beat of silence. “That’s good. Did that man-whore try to ask that chick out again?”

I was trying to get him to laugh, because talking about that guy in his class -- I think his name was . . . Mark, maybe? Tweek mentioned it, I didn’t remember -- always made him laugh. He loved making fun of that guy, it was almost always the first thing he said to me after his chemistry class. Just an immediate, “She rejected him again, it was so funny!”

But he didn’t even crack a smile. “I wasn’t paying attention.”

Another beat of silence. It was like pulling teeth trying to get him to communicate. “What’d you end up getting on your math test? You never told me.”

He cleared his throat, and hunched into himself more. “I got an A.”

I smiled widely and said, “That’s awesome, babe! We should celebrate!”

“It wasn’t that hard.”

“Still, I’m proud of you!”

Tweek glanced up at me again, but this time, the look in his eyes was more of a warning than anything else. “I just want to sit here and draw. Okay?”

I didn’t know what I was expecting, but part of me was, and part of me wasn’t, surprised by his response. I sighed. Sitting there in silence with Tweek’s mindset probably wasn’t good for him. Letting him stew in his misery _definitely_ wasn’t, but, at that point, me talking to him and trying to get him to talk back was just making it worse, so I resolved to just give him some space. “Okay. I’m sorry, I’ll . . . leave you to your drawing then. I’m here, though, okay?”

“I can see that.”

I looked away and felt something chip away at my heart. It was like there was a tiny man in my chest, and every time Tweek brushed me off, he took a pickax and just picked tirelessly at any organ within reach. At some point, my breast bone was just going to break, and at _some_ point, I was going to lose it.

 

Some hours later, I tapped on the next video in my recommended section, (all night, I’d been watching videos that didn’t have a narrator, and instead had the words displayed on the screen, just so I could have my ears on him in case he needed me), when I noticed movement out of the corner of my eye. Tweek shut the light off from his side of the room, and I expected him to turn on his side away from me, but he hopped lightly to his feet, crossed the room, stopped in front of my bed, and said quietly,

“Craig? Can I lay down with you?”  

I felt a rush of excitement at the fact that, even though he refused to talk to me, he still wanted to sleep next to me. It meant he wasn’t shutting me out completely. So I immediately blackened my screen, and lifted up the blankets to accommodate him. He climbed in, and latched onto me, his arms wrapping around my body and his face pressing into my chest.

I glanced down at him, placing a prolonged kiss on the top of his head. “Goodnight, Tweek.”

Tweek whimpered. “Goodnight, Craig.”

“I love you.”

There was a beat of silence. “I love you, too. A _lot_.”

That whole cycle continued for like a week, and there was no change in Tweek’s attitude.  I took . . . I don’t know, _some_ comfort in that he wasn’t, like, _deteriorating_ , or anything, but I just didn’t know how to help him. It didn’t really seem like he wanted help; he wouldn’t even admit that something was wrong. He just kept himself locked up from the world and disappeared into his head whenever he knew he wasn’t needed for conversation. And even then, sometimes he just checked right the fuck out. He still nestled into my arms at night and held my hand on the way to classes in the morning, and, even though his grip was tighter than it normally was, he wouldn’t meet my eyes.

I didn’t know how to help him and I hated that I didn’t know how to help him.

All I knew was that I needed reinforcements.

* * *

212.

That was the number staring me in the face on the second floor of an . . . okay, I guess, apartment building.

“I can’t believe I’m asking that dick for help,” I mumbled, but I raised a first up and wrapped harshly on the stained wood. About five seconds later, when I still didn’t hear anyone coming, I knocked harder and groaned,  “Come on, you asshole, open the fucking door.”

A few seconds later, the door swung open. It was Kenny, wearing a baby blue apron and wielding one of those kitchen spoons with the hole in the middle of it? Forget what those are for, but I wasn’t really worried about it. “Fucker?” Kenny asked, raising an eyebrow. “What are you doing here? Where’s your second half?”

I rolled my eyes. “He’s at class. I skipped. I need to talk to you.”

Kenny seemed surprised, but let me inside. “Um. Okay? Come into the kitchen, I’m making lunch.”

I followed him past the living room and into this tiny kitchen with a counter that was about two feet long, a beaten up old fridge, a _very_ old fashioned stove, and a dining room table that was just one of those fold-able card tables. I pulled my bookbag up and over my head and sat down, watching as he put a small pot on one of the burners and turned the stove top on. “So. What do you need me for?”

“It’s about Tweek.”

Kenny snorted. “Well, yeah, I kind of figured that out for myself. What about him?”

I let out a breath, drumming my fingers on the top absently. “I’m worried about him. Have you noticed anything off about him lately?”

He glanced over his shoulder at me. “He’s seemed a little down, yeah. What happened?”

“That’s the thing,” I said flatly. “I don’t know. I know you guys are friends, so maybe he’s told you something. He’s been acting _really_ weird, but he won’t tell me why. I’m going crazy.”

Kenny shrugged, and turned back around. “Maybe he doesn’t want you to know.”

I quirked my lips. That was a response that I couldn’t tolerate. “I know that there is at least one major thing that he hasn’t told me. He says he doesn’t talk about it with anyone, and I respect that. I do. He promised me that he’d tell me eventually, when he was ready, and I trust him.” I let out a breath and ran a hand along my jaw. “But I want to make sure he’s okay. He tells me he is, but I just . . . I can’t just believe that.” To prove my point even more, despite my embarrassment, I added, “He doesn’t kiss me back anymore. He’ll let me kiss him, but he doesn’t do anything. He won’t look me in the eye. All he wants to do is sleep, do homework, and draw in his notebook. The last thing he told me _willingly_ was that he hated February, and just shrugged when I asked him why, and that was a week ago.”

“Maybe something happened to him in February,” Kenny said thoughtfully. “Maybe the month in general is just a reminder of it. That’d be my best guess.”

That made sense. I guess. It explained why he wouldn’t tell me exactly what was wrong. He was secretive about certain things, and I knew not to press too much. I propped my elbows up on the table and rubbed at my eyes. “Jesus Christ, he’s gonna kill me one of these days.”

“Perks of having a boyfriend,” Kenny said with a chuckle. I dropped my arms and glared at the back of his head, but he continued before I could answer him. “If it makes you feel better, I’ll keep an eye on him, make sure he doesn’t get in trouble or anything. Do you want me to talk to him?”

I sighed. “Yeah. That’d be good. He trusts you, too. I just . . . fuck, I want to make sure that asshole’s okay. I fucking _hate_ seeing him like that. It pisses me off.” I was starting to get irritated just thinking about it.

After a brief pause, in which Kenny tossed some chopped up tomatoes into the pot and started to stir absently, he said, “You’re a good man, Tucker.” The words sounded like they _should’ve_ been sarcastic, because I really wasn’t all that great of a person, and the both of us knew that. But it came across genuine, which I was a little surprised by. “Tweek’s a lucky guy.”

I didn’t know what to say to that, so I cleared my throat and said, “Um. Thanks.”

“Yeah. You’re welcome,” Kenny said, tapping the stirring spoon on the edge of the pot and resting it on a paper towel beside the stove. “So. What do you want me to say to him? I don’t want to overstep anything, if it’s as bad as you say it is.”

That was a tough question, mostly because Tweek was so unpredictable, and I had never been in a situation even remotely similar to the one I was in. I didn’t want to overstep, either. “I don’t know,” I said blankly.

There was a beat of silence. “Okay, well that’s not helpful at all.”

“Just.” I grunted in annoyance. “Ease him into it, I guess. Don’t make it obvious that you’re prying.”

“ _Am_ I prying?” Kenny asked, leveling a raised eyebrow at me over his shoulder.

That question had an easy answer. No. I didn’t want him to pry. I didn’t want him to force Tweek to talk about whatever it was that was bothering him. That would make everything much worse. But if _I_ was the problem, if Tweek wasn’t confiding in me because he was scared I’d have a bad reaction or whatever, then I wanted him to at least have someone. Anyone. And Kenny was the best bet.

“No,” I said out loud. “Don’t pry. I don’t want him to feel like he has to say anything. I don’t want to pressure him. I just want him to know he has options. And he trusts you. For _some_ reason.” I rolled my eyes when Kenny snorted. “So maybe he’ll feel comfortable talking to you.”

“Okay. Go study or something tomorrow,” Kenny said, turning the stove top off. “I’ll stop by your dorm room, see how he’s doing.”

I nodded, feeling, in that moment, very grateful for Kenny’s existence. “Thank you, Kenny.”

“If it’s for Tweek, you don’t have to thank me,” was Kenny’s fond response.

* * *

About an hour after my talk with Kenny, I left his apartment to pick Tweek up from class. I was hoping -- purposelessly, apparently -- that Tweek was going to be back to normal when I showed up outside one of the math buildings. But that was a thought I’d been having a lot; that maybe the whole ordeal was a fever dream, and my Tweek was actually just fine. That he would smile when he caught my eye, or wave excitedly when I started walking towards him.

But I got that same blank look, and those same robotic movements, and I let out a disappointed sigh.

* * *

I followed Kenny’s advice, and I left Tweek alone in our dorm room to meet Token and Clyde at the library to study. I gave him a one-sided kiss on my way out the door and I told him I loved him, letting a partially-relieved sigh when he whimpered the words back to me.

At least that was _one_ thing that he hadn’t taken away from me.

* * *

So I was trying to work on my calculus homework, (computing limits and it was extremely -- extremely -- exciting), but, like I had expected, Clyde wasn’t really letting Token and I study. I guess we weren’t close enough to midterms or finals for him to care about studying, so he was flicking paper footballs at us, and calling us nerds, and making groan-worthy puns that weren’t even relevant to what we were doing. (A lot of which involved cheese, the chubby asshole.)

I’d been trying to focus my eyes on my textbook for about forty five minutes when I heard my phone ping. I glanced over and saw that it was Kenny, and all the text said was,

_He’s not happy._

I rolled my eyes. I kind of already figured that part out for myself. So I answered,

_Yeah, I know._

Kenny responded,

_No, I mean with you._

And then,

_He figured out you asked me to talk to him._

And then,

_He’s not happy._

I let out a sigh. Fuck. So that meant I was in for a pretty shitty conversation when I got back to our dorm room. I could understand Tweek’s point in being angry, of course, but I understood my point even more.

At least I had some time to brainstorm how to respond to his anger. I knew I was going to need it. 

* * *

 When I walked into my dorm room, I knew immediately that something was off. Mostly because Tweek was standing in the center of our dorm room -- almost like he was waiting for me to show up -- and had a wild glare on his face.

Before I even had the chance to say hello, he shouted, “You sent Kenny to _guard_ me, like I’m a fucking _child_!”

I guess I deserved that. “Tweek --”

“GAH! What gave you the right to do that?!”

I frowned at him. Why couldn’t he understand I was worried about him? I thought I was pretty in the green in being worried! “ _I_ gave myself the right. You’ve been acting so weird lately. I just want to make sure you’re okay, and if it’s not something you can talk to _me_ about, I want you to at least talk to _someone_. You’re locking yourself in your head, and I won’t let you do that anymore.”

“You won’t _let_ me?!”

“You’re damn right I won’t!” Alright, so I was starting to get a little pissed off. “I know what being stuck inside your head is like, and it doesn’t end well!”

“I’m not acting any different, I've always been like this,” he responded, a dark bite to his words.

I huffed, because, okay, so I was starting to get a _lot_ pissed off. Without saying anything, I gripped his face and laid a rough kiss to his lips. As I expected, he jolted in surprise, but otherwise didn’t react, not even on instinct. I pulled back a couple seconds later and said triumphantly, “You see that? _That’s_ you acting weirder than normal! You haven’t kissed me back in a whole _week_ \--”

I guess my words didn’t sit right with Tweek, because he growled at me in a way he never had before, and he grabbed onto the handles of my chullo, pulled me down to his height, and kissed me hard. I was too surprised by his sudden aggressiveness to kiss back right away, and I guess Tweek used that as ammunition to prove his own point, because he pulled back, our lips parting making a loud popping sound, and he hissed,

“ _You want me to kiss back? I’ll kiss back._ ”

And then he kissed me again. Except it was even harder the second time, our teeth clanking together, and he ferociously suction-cupped himself to my body. It was hard keeping up with him, I could barely process everything that was happening, there was too much going on at once.

“Am I kissing back enough for you?” he asked, but that time, there were tears in his voice. “Is this what you want? GAH!” When he made his shriek noise, he bit my bottom lip sharply, and I yelped, practically jumping out of my fucking body. I knew he didn’t mean to do it, but he didn’t acknowledge it, and just kept talking.

“What do you want next, huh?! You want me on my knees, sucking you off? Because that’s what Tweek would do, wouldn’t he? Or do you want me on my back? GAH! You want to _fuck_ me? Do it, fuck me right now, Craig, because if you want that sooo bad, and it’ll make you sooo happy, then fucking do it! Whatever the fuck you want Craig, because it’s _always about you!_ ”

I growled, and gripped his shoulders, prying him off of my body and holding him at arm’s length. “That’s not what I mean!” I yelled back, my chest churning painfully. I hated yelling at him, but I was just so damn frustrated. I didn’t know how to help him, nothing seemed to work.

“Then what do you mean? I don’t understand, what do you want from me?!” he shrieked, his eyes wet and flaring dangerously at me.

“I want you to be okay!” I shouted back, “Because I know you’re not, and that’s killing me! Before I blow my fucking head off, just . . . _be okay_ , okay?”

“ ** _I AM OKAY!_ ** ” Tweek screamed so loud, that even Jack’s roommate all the way in the North Carolina probably heard him.

“No you’re not!”

“So now you can read my mind?!”

“Tweek, you’re being unreasonable --”

“GRRRRR! _Who’s_ being unreasonable --”

“It’s not that big of a deal, just --”

“ _Not that big a deal?_ ”

The second those words left Tweek’s mouth, I realized I fucked up. That was a really fucking stupid thing to say, because regardless of how angry I was, I did know that it was a big deal.

A huge fucking deal.

I let out a breath, closing my eyes and pinching the bridge of my nose. “Tweek, that’s --”

“IT _IS_ A BIG DEAL CRAIG, IT’S A _BIG DEAL_!” Tweek screeched, burying his fingers into his hair and tugging harsh enough to rip strands clear out. He opened his hands and let the locks fall to the floor, and resumed his grip. “NGH! GRR!! _Youdon’tknowwhatyou’refuckingtalkingabout!_ ”

I knew better than to try to touch him, despite that being my first instinct in that situation, so I fixed my eyes to him, using an attempted calmness to ease his panic. “Tweek.” I brought my voice to that comforting tone that, more often than not, worked like a charm on him. But, I wasn’t so sure it would work that time. “I want you to listen to me.”

“What?!” Tweek hissed. “What could you _possibly_ have to say? You don’t know _anything_ , so don’t act like you do!”

I steeled myself at his tone. “I don’t know anything, because you haven’t _told_ me anything. I’m just trying to help, Tweek.”

Tweek all but stamped his foot. “I didn’t _ask_ for help!”

“But you need it!” I snapped back. “I’m not going through this again, we’re talking in circles! You get mad, I get mad, I stop being mad, and then _you_ make me mad again!”

Tweek narrowed his eyes. “So it’s _my_ fault?”

“I’m not saying that,” I said firmly. “But I am saying that it’s not _my_ fault, either. We both just need to calm down and think rationally --”

“I don’t want to think rationally!” Tweek snapped, taking a few steps away from me and starting to pace again.

“If you don’t, you’re just going to keep freaking out,” I said, my eyes following him as he walked around in wild circles.

“ _You’re not helping --_ ”

“I thought you didn’t want help,” I said flatly. I was a little annoyed with him; I mean, I could obviously see that he was extremely distressed by something that he refused to share with me, but his flip-flopping approach to our conversation was just making everything more complicated than it needed to be. If he just took a deep breath and stopping thinking from the perspective of someone who was freaking out, I’m sure he would’ve gotten along a lot better, and the problem would’ve been resolved a lot faster.

I hated seeing Tweek like that, but I was giving him the advice to ease his troubles, and he wasn’t listening to me. Which meant he was the cause behind his own freak out, and that fucking pissed me the fuck _off_.

“I _don’t_!” Tweek shrieked. He looked so mad that he didn’t even look mad anymore, if that makes sense. “Just get out, _get out_! I can’t take it!”

“No,” I said simply, leaning up against the closed door and folding my arms over my chest. There was no way in fuck I was just going to leave him there by himself, not when he was so obviously fucked up.

Tweek growled at me. “Fine! _I’ll_ leave!” And then he walked towards me and tried to nudge me out of the way, but I held fast and didn’t move. I wasn’t going to let him go out in public in midst of a mental breakdown. Even if he was going to Kenny’s apartment, (which he was, most definitely), he’d still have the fifteen minute walk there, seething and on the brink of homicide, and, for his safety and the safety of everyone he passed on the street, I wasn’t going to allow that to happen either.

“GAH! Let me _leave_!”

I shook my head. “No.”

“Jesus Christ! _I can’t be around you right now!_ ”

“You don’t have to talk to me,” I said, resting my head on the door and leveling an even look in his direction. “I’ll just stand here, and I’ll leave you alone. But I’m not leaving you by yourself.”

“I want to be _alone_!”

Tweek may have wanted to be alone, but I was legitimately terrified of leaving him. He was hurt and he was scared, and, even though I didn’t know why, I did know that he was pushing me away to nurture this secret that he didn’t want me to know. And he didn’t have to tell me his secret if he didn’t want to, I wasn’t going to nag him until he spilled. It was his business. I just wished he’d let me help him cope with whatever it was.

“You can just pretend I’m not here,” I told him. “I’m good at being quiet.”

“I can’t pretend you’re not here because you _are_ here!”

I shrugged but didn’t answer him. If he was that determined to be a total mess and not at least try to get help, then I was going to be equally determined to not let him be a mess on his own. And that sounds like a dick thing to say, but I was just so annoyed with the situation. I’ve said it before a million times, and I’ll say it again a million times, I just wanted him to be okay. That was all. Just for him to be okay.

I guess, at that point, Tweek knew that I wasn’t going to budge, and, even though he looked about ready to punch my lights out, I knew he wasn’t going to. He was the most stubborn person I’d ever met, but I could tell in the way he growled at the entire room that he aware that he was out of options.

He turned away from me and grumbled incomprehensible words under his breath as he paced the length of our dorm room. He seemed dead-set on completely ignoring my existence, which I was okay with. As long as I was around him and knew he wasn’t hurting himself or doing something completely reckless, I was . . . okay with him avoiding me.

He’d been pacing around for maybe five minutes before I guess he stepped too angrily and he tripped over his own feet, catching himself at the last second. With a loud, frustrated growl, he shouted, “ _Fuck you!_ ” at the floor, and then continued pacing.

I had to bite back the words, “Be careful,” because the last thing Tweek needed was a broken bone or a twisted ankle or something. So I kept my eyes on him, following him as he wound in circles around our dorm room. Just watching him made my chest hurt, because my Tweek looked so fucking distraught, like his world was ending and he didn’t know how to stop it, and I wanted to help him so bad, it was eating me the fuck up inside.

I was woken from my thoughts when Tweek screeched, “ _Stop watching at me!_ ”

“I’m here to make sure you don’t hurt yourself. I kind of have to watch you.”

“Oh my God, Jesus _Christ_! You’re _smothering_ me, Craig!”

I felt a jolt shoot through my heart, because that was the last thing my worried, practically lovesick heart wanted to hear. Smothering him? He thought I was _smothering_ him? He thought I was _that_ clingy and desperate? I wasn’t clingy or desperate! I was fucking worried beyond fucking belief, there’s a fucking difference!

Feeling a heaviness in my chest, I leveled a glare at him. “Fine. I’ll give you some space. But don’t come crying to me when you have a nightmare and nobody’s there to hold you and calm you down. Because if caring is your definition of smothering, then I’ll ease back.” I rolled my eyes and turned my face away. “Anything to make you happy.”

“NGH! That’s not what I mean!” he growled at me, tugging so harshly at his hair that clumps feathered to the floor from between his trembling fingers. “I don’t want you to go!”

See, there he was, being a flip-flopping asshole again. “I’m not going to go,” I said flatly. “I want to avoid you doing something drastic, so I’ll just sit here, but you don’t have to worry about me bothering you.”

“ERK! AHH! But Craig, ngh, I _want_ you to bother me!” 

I huffed. "Then why did you tell me to leave?" I asked, unimpressed by his hypocrisy.

"GAH! EHH! _I don't know_!" he said, his head jerking to the side and he tugged at the front of his shirt. "I just -- NGH! -- I don't want you to go!" He took a few heaving breaths, his gaze never leaving me once, not even to blink.

And then a few moments later, the tears that had gathered in the corners of his eyes collapsed and started streaming down his cheeks. His face crumpled, his lips quivering. "I . . . I  don’t want you to _go_ ,” he added in a shaky, broken voice.

It took me a few seconds, but I ultimately felt stupid by my own irritation, because with those words I realized then what ‘go’ meant to him. He knew I wasn’t going to leave him physically; I’d made a point to him every day that he was always going to be my Tweek. But he didn’t want me to recede into myself, he didn’t want me to distance myself. Because distance meant something terrible for him. Tweek loved being close with me, he loved it when I touched him, or held him, or told him how much he meant to me.

I advanced towards him as fast as my long legs could take me, and when I reached him, I wrapped my arms around him tightly, pressing his face into my chest. He whimpered, bringing his own arms around my waist and squeezing me so tightly, I was almost sure my innards were going to explode from every one of my orifices.

“Don’t go, please don’t go,” he whimpered into my sweatshirt, rubbing his head back and forth, like he was yearning to be even closer, even though we were so close already that we were practically one person.

“I’m not gonna go,” I mumbled into his hair. “I promise I won’t go.”

Tweek pulled back, his breaths coming in short and quick. He stared at me desperately, like he was pleading with his eyes for me to do something, even though I didn’t know what it was he needed.

But then his lips started quivering and soft cries escaped his mouth, and my heart just about broke. There was literally nothing I could do physically, because it was impossible for us to get closer. So imagine my surprise when Tweek twisted in my arms so that we were further apart. And then imagine my further surprise when Tweek bent his knees slightly, gripped my shoulders, and sprung upwards.

Realizing immediately what he was trying to do, I caught him under his thighs and helped him wrap himself around me, his feet crossed behind me and his arms locked around my neck. He was shaking _horrifically_ ; the last time I’d seen him that worked up was during that huge fight we’d had, right before we were away from each other for like two weeks.

He started crying right into my ear, sobbing, “I hate February, I hate it _so much_ , Jesus Christ, I can’t _take_ it!”

I hushed him, carrying him over to my bed and sitting myself down. I gave his back gentle caresses, and felt my heart seize in my chest at the gut-wrenching sorrow that was practically oozing from his aura. I had to swallow to keep my emotions to myself, because I needed to be his anchor; he didn’t need me to be freaking out too. But words cannot fucking express how fucking hard it was to see him like that.

Without my consent, my brain wandered to several occasions where just a kiss on his cheek would send him into a giggle fit, or how a single ‘I love you’ would make his face flame red and a shy little smile spread across his lips. It just made my chest constrict even more, but I was forced back into the situation when Tweek shrieked,

“I want out, Craig, I want out! I want out, I want out, I want _out_ \--”

“Shh, breath, Tweek,” I whispered, biting my bottom lip harshly to keep my voice as steady as possible. I lifted a hand up and brushed my fingers through his hair. “You need to breath.”

“It wasn’t my fault!” he practically shouted. “ _It wasn’t me_!”

I didn’t know what that meant, so I just agreed with him, just to let him know I was listening and that I wasn’t going to question his half-coherent words. “I know it wasn’t you.”

“It wasn’t like I _asked_ for it, they _gave_ it to me!”

That somehow made even less sense, but I responded to him in turn. “I know they did.”

“I was just a kid, I didn’t know! I . . . Jesus Christ, man, I _didn’t know!_ ”

“I know you didn’t, honey.”

A single, loud sob escaped Tweek’s mouth, and he tightened his grip around my neck to the point where he was almost choking me. “It felt so good, Craig! Sometimes I just -- I just miss it so much!”

That . . . didn’t sound good. And I didn’t even know where to fucking start with it. “Tweek --”

“I _know_ I’m not making sense, okay? I _know_ I’m not, but just . . . GAH! -- _oh God!_ ” Tweek fell into disembodied sobs, his face pressed into the crook of my neck and his body curled around mine, like a cat. I could feel tears pool down and make a wet spot on my sweatshirt and I tightened my grip on him, placing gentle kisses along the top of his head.

And then I just . . . let him cry. Even though I was desperately trying to come up with a way to make him feel better, I knew that he just needed to cry, as hard as that was for me to deal with.

Because it wasn’t about me. It was about Tweek, and I had to shove all that protective, chest-constricting panic down and try to focus on rocking him back and forth and giving his back long, slow caresses.

 

Finally, maybe a half hour later, Tweek and I were still in the same position on my bed. His sobs had lessened considerably, and he sat sniffling and hiccuping and whining. I continued what I’d been doing, just stroking his back and rocking gently, just hoping he was going to calm down soon. I wanted to see his smile again. It’d been too long.

Sluggishly, Tweek pulled back. I tried to keep my face passive, in that calming flatness that I knew Tweek liked, but it was hard. My heart was aching for him, and I didn’t even know why he was hurting to begin with.

Tweek’s eyes were red and puffy, his face splotchy and wet, and there was a kind of brokenness in the way he was staring at me. I had never seen someone look at me like that before. 

We stared at each other for awhile, talking silent words that couldn’t be translated verbally. I reached my hands up, resting them on his cheeks, and stroked just under his eyes, brushing his tears away.

“My head hurts,” he said finally, screwing up one side of his face.

That made sense. He’d expelled like 90% of his fluids just by crying. I lifted one of my arms from him, blindly reaching for an unopened water bottle from my bedside table. “Drink some water,” I told him, unscrewing the top off for him and offering it to him.

With shaky hands, he took it from me and gulped down like half of the bottle in three gulps, before setting it down.

“Do you want some ibuprofen?” I asked.

Tweek hardly gave that question a second thought, and just shook his head. “I’ll be okay.” He gave me a smile, but it was extremely forced, and it was totally obvious that he was holding a shit ton of shitty emotions back.

And that was quite clearly a lie, on several fronts, but I took it at face value. “Okay. Is there anything you need?”

A look of endless gratitude and admiration crossed his face, and, with awe in his eyes, he shook his head again. “No,” he said, his voice still shaky and hoarse from his incessant shouting and sobbing. He was silent for a few seconds, just observing my face for a while, before he spoke again.

“Thank you, Craig.”

And he sounded so . . . well, _grateful_ , like I had done some grandiose favor for him. And, needless to say, I didn’t feel comfortable with him thanking me, because, as far as I was concerned, I hadn’t done anything worthy of thanking. What I'd done wasn't to scrounge up some gratitude from my boyfriend, it was to make my boyfriend capable of gratitude, if that makes any sense. It was to restore him, at least somewhat, to the Tweek I'd known before. I wanted to eliminate everything he was going through, because he was hurting, and I hated that he was hurting. So I gave him a kiss on the forehead and said, “I love you.”

He let out a sigh and pressed his head harder into my lips. “I love you, too.”

“Are you okay?” I asked. A dumb fucking question, because it was quite obvious he wasn’t, but I wanted to see if he’d made any progress since the beginning of our little chat.

He chewed on his bottom lip, and I could see the cogs turning in his head. “No,” he settled on slowly, closing his eyes shut tight and pressing his cheek in to my neck so I couldn’t see his face. “I . . .” he did a weird groan thing. “Not really.”

At least he was finally admitting it. _That_ was progress.

I rubbed his back gently, the tips of my fingers ghosting his olive green button-up. “Do you want to talk about it?” I already knew he didn’t, but I wanted him to know that the second he was ready to confide in me, I would be there in a fucking heartbeat.

He shook his head as soon as the last word left my mouth. “No.”

“Okay,” I agreed easily. I was done pressuring him. Trapping him in a room against his will, recruiting the help of an outside source that 'checked up on him' like he was a patient in an asylum, forcing my worry onto him. I was wrong in a lot of my actions in regards to Tweek's emotions and moods from the duration of February up until that point, and I knew that after the fact. I was so distracted by my need for him to get better that I hadn't really considered the fact that him shoving down his emotions under the basis of simple logic didn't help him. It caused the freak-out that he had just recovered from. (Or, recovered as much as he could've.) 

“I just . . .” Tweek let out a long sigh. “I don’t know how good I’ll be for awhile,” he mumbled miserably, and almost apologetically.

“That’s okay,” I said, but then immediately realized how fucking stupid that sounded, so I backpedaled and added hastily, “I mean, it’s not okay, because I want you to get better. But I get it if there are things you have to do in order to be happy again. Just tell me what you need, and if I’m physically capable of it, I’ll do it for you.”

Tweek gave me a small smile and I felt my heart melt at the sincerity behind it. It wasn’t forced, it wasn’t for my benefit, it wasn’t a stand-in for an awkward interaction, it was genuine. He was happy. I had made him happy. “Thanks, Craig.”

“Yeah, well. Whenever you smile, I smile,” I said, grinning back at him.

There was a beat of silence, in which Tweek just blinked up at me, confused. “Was that . . . did you just quote Justin Bieber?”

I quirked my eyebrows, and steeled my expression when Tweek raised an eyebrow at me.

A slow smile spread across his face, his eyes crinkling at the corners. “Did you just _quote_ Justin Bieber?”

God his fucking smile. I'd missed it so much. And I quite literally could not have helped the grin I gave him, even if there was a gun to my head. I was selfish, I know, I was aware of it, but I couldn't stop myself. I missed Tweek being happy, I missed him being able to smile, and being able to converse with me without his voice falling flat and his eyes half-lidded with a seemingly irrevocable distance. 

“If I did, it was an accident,” I said with a grin.

“I don't believe you,” he said, pulling himself away from me slightly, while still keeping his arms around me. “Why didn’t you tell me you’re a belieber?”

I chuckled at how amused he was, dropping my hands to his hips. “Hey, you knew that was from a Bieber song, so explain that.”

Tweek's smile was contagious. It wasn't his normal, full-fledged smile that showed off his coffee teeth; there was still some kind of a distraction behind his eyes, but it was the kind of smile that said he was trying. (Hopefully not just for my sake.) He pushed lightly at my shoulders so that I fell flat on my back and then he dropped on top of me, become straight dead weight on my chest. He propped his chin up on the back of his hands and just looked at me, eyes half-lidded. “I plead the fifth amendment, and I’m exercising my Miranda rights.”

“Which Justin did you like best?” I asked, completely ignoring his statement. “Teen-bop Bieber, or pissing-in-buckets Bieber?”

“I’m not saying another word until I can talk to my lawyer,” Tweek said his voice lazy and amused.

For maybe ten minutes we exchanged smiles and light teasing, a nostalgia-inducing activity that eventually resulted in a long yawn forcing Tweek’s entire face to crumple. As he was coming down, letting out a huff of air, I brushed a lock of blonde hair behind his ear.

“You want to get some sleep?” I asked.

Tweek nodded slowly. “Yeah. Tired.”

Yeah, I kind of figured. To accommodate him, I reached up behind me and turned off the lamp on my bedside table. And, when I turned my attention back to him, I noticed he had turned onto his side away from me. So I scooched towards him, the plan to spoon him fresh in my mind. But, before I had a chance to do that, Tweek took hold of one of my arms and dragged it around his body, trapping himself against my chest. He whimpered, his face pressed into my pillow, and he said, “Hold me.” It was a statement, so basically, he wasn’t really giving me a choice. But it wasn’t like I would say no, under any circumstance ever.

He fell asleep kind of quickly for Tweek. He was probably extremely tired from all the physical exertion of sobbing and pacing and shouting. And also from the mental exhaustion, I can’t even imagine what he’d gone through.

Something told me that the next day was going to be better. But something else told me it would be the same as the week behind us. I just didn’t know, there were so many uncertainties. All in all, I was confident that it wasn’t going to be worse.

I hoped so, at least.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I tried to make this chapter as realistic as possible, psychologically-wise, and also character-wise. I researched the topic to make sure it was accurate, but I'm sorry if I got some things wrong about what Tweek is going through. 
> 
> So please please please tell me what you think, I'm actually desperate to know if I did this whole chapter wrong, and I'm sorry if I offend anyone who suffers through depression brought on by past trauma. I tried my best, I swear I did. It's just not something I've been through before, so I tried to portray the situation as truthfully as I could.


	30. Shut the Fuck Up

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: more mentions of past trauma, and referenced suicide. 
> 
> While I promise this is the last chapter that is focused solely on Tweek's past trauma, (detailing how much it's still affecting him, that is), I just want to say that, oh my goodness I hope I'm pulling this off.... Again, please tell me if I'm doing anything wrong, I'm really not all that knowledgeable on this subject.

When I was in second grade, I had a fever dream that everything I cared about died. That meant my parents, Tricia, my guinea pig, and Clyde, Token, and Jimmy, they all died at the same time. It was really gory and gross. Like, they were bleeding all around me on the floor, crying and shit. It was terrible.

But I was also extremely sick, with a fever of 104. I kept looming in and out of consciousness, so my dreams kind of melded with my waking hours and made reality feel like dreams and my dreams like reality. I only really remember part of what was happening to me, (partially due to the fact that it happened when I was, like, seven, but also because the few days I was down for the count just blurred into one long painful memory that I guess I’d blotted out immediately after it happened), but certain circumstances were bringing that memory to the forefront of my mind.

I never told anyone about it, because I had never found the right time to. I also never really thought about it, either, because it was such a weird fucking experience.

But Tweek’s ordeal, whatever the fuck he was going through, made me think about it. And I, logically, sifted through any number of possibilities that could explain why Tweek was hurting so much.

The first thing I thought about was his Uncle Bryan. He killed himself when Tweek was a pre-teen, and he was the only person that Tweek trusted growing up. Maybe Tweek had left out the details of his Uncle Bryan’s death; maybe instead of his parents sitting him down and telling him, maybe Tweek found his uncle on his own. He didn’t tell me how his uncle killed himself, but however it happened, it would’ve been equally bad. Even if there wasn’t anything particularly gory, even if his uncle just swallowed a bottle of pills, shaking someone you love and not being able to get them to wake up must’ve been a horrible thing to go through.

But at the same time, I figured Tweek wouldn’t have been able to talk about his uncle so casually if that had been the case. He would’ve kept his uncle a complete secret if just thinking about his death sent Tweek into a spiral of melancholia.

That didn’t mean I could definitively dismiss it, though.

I was starting to suspect that whatever the fuck Tweek was going through somehow had to do with his parents, and there was no way that I would be able to change my mind unless Tweek himself told me otherwise. The possibilities, however, were endless in that respect, and I didn’t really want my mind to wander down winding roads of plausible trauma without anything concrete.

So, trying not to think about my Tweek in pain was how I fell asleep the night after I had officially calmed him down.

* * *

I was surprised that, when I blinked my eyes open, (not prompted by an alarm or sudden noise), the other side of my bed was empty.

No Tweek.

I bolted upright, feeling a brief spike of terror, because I _somehow_ didn’t notice Tweek getting up. I guess I underestimated how tired I actually was, or maybe Tweek had gotten up extra carefully and had avoided knocking my body as he climbed over me. My eyes frantically swept the room, and they landed on Tweek almost immediately. He was standing in front of his coffee maker, (where else), his arms folded over his stomach as he watched a thin stream of dark coffee sprinkling into his lime green mug.

But it was his face that I was especially focusing on. I was _dreading_ that blank stare from the past couple weeks.

But it wasn’t there. It wasn’t that tired, content expression that he usually had in the morning, (before February, that is), but it wasn’t completely void of emotion. There was something in his eyes that insinuated his knowledge of his presence in the moment, like he knew and was engaged in his surroundings, and I let out a huge fucking sigh of relief that the night before wasn’t for nothing.

I threw the blanket off of me as quietly as I could, hopped lightly to my feet, and stalked silently to where Tweek stood. I wrapped my arms around his waist from behind and said, my voice light and accommodating, “‘Morning honey. How are you doing?”

Tweek shrieked, stiffening in my arms, but I kept a firm, comforting grasp on him, giving the top of his head a few gentle kisses. As of the beginning of February, he was still a little jumpy at sudden displays of physical affection, (he was more than enthusiastic if he was initiating it, but he was a little hesitant when I did it myself), but I knew he would ease into it, even if it took him a few seconds to calm down.

And, sure, it took him awhile, but he slowly relaxed in my hug, gripping at my hands that were folded over his stomach. He tilted his head up, muttering, “Good,” and he offered me his mouth.

I smiled, giving him a peck on the lips. I fucking lived for domesticity. “Yeah?”

A small smile pulled at Tweek’s lips, and he rolled his eyes, turning his attention back to his coffee maker. “Yeah.”

Just as that word left his mouth, the coffee maker dribbled to a stop, his mug filled to the brim with his coffee, and he released my hands to reach for his morning caffeine fix. Wrapping his fingers around the body of the mug, he leaned back into me and said,

“Black coffee only has five calories.”

I already knew that, because Tweek had told me that several times, but I felt my heart smile at the fact that he was starting to tell me that completely useless fact all over again. Like he thought it was entirely new to me. “Oh, yeah?” I asked.

“Mhmm,” he said, taking short sips of his coffee and letting out a contented sigh. “If I lived off of a 2000 calorie a day diet, I’d have to drink _400 cups of coffee_.”

Another fact that I could recite off the top of my head, courtesy of Tweek. “What about food?”

“Coffee,” was all he said, taking more substantial sips of his coffee as it slowly started to cool off.

I snorted, giving his stomach gentle caresses, trying not to tickle him too much. “You’d fry your brain,” I observed casually. “Or your heart. Probably both.”

“But it’d be totally worth it,” he responded.

“Not sure that’s true --”

“What time is it?” Tweek interrupted, putting his coffee onto his bedside table and twisting around in my arms.

In order to answer that question, I would’ve had to cross the room to get my phone. Otherwise, I wasn’t a mind reader. And I tried to get out of Tweek’s tight grasp -- I swear I did -- but Tweek’s grasp was . . . tight. Like, really tight. Like, I would’ve had to pry him off of me with a crowbar to get free.

I looked down at him, amused. “You’d have to let go of me first. So I can get to my phone.”

With pinkening cheeks, Tweek shook his head. “Does class start in less than half an hour?”

I glanced out the window at the still orange sky. Obviously not. “No. I’m guessing an hour, maybe an hour and a half.”

“Then that’s okay, I don’t need to know yet,” he said, resting his head on my chest and letting out a long breath.

There was gratitude in every move he made, and it was starting to make me feel a little uncomfortable. I loved holding him, I always loved holding him, but it kind of felt like he was doing it for me just a tad more than he was doing it for himself. But I didn’t want to draw attention to my suspicions, so I just stayed in the same position, enjoying the extended physical affection that was lasting way longer than I first thought it was going to.

 

Sure enough, an hour later, Tweek and I were getting dressed, (Tweek, after some fantastic interactions, had gotten more comfortable being naked around me), preparing to leave for class. I had never wanted to skip class more that morning than pretty much any other morning ever, but I took comfort in the fact that at least it was Friday; we only had one class, and then we wouldn’t have anything to do until Monday. I was even willing to bet Tweek would be okay with skipping the majority of our homework.

Tweek managed small talk on the way to and from classes, but he still seemed so fucking out if it. There was this haunted look behind his eyes, and it didn’t even matter what we were talking about it. Even if it was his favorite subject in the whole world, (something along the lines of conspiracy theories and his disdain for pretty much every political leader ever). It seemed like Tweek was putting in an extraordinary amount of effort just to smile at me, but that wasn’t entirely the point. The point was, he found the motivation somewhere to try to smile. He was showing that entirely shutting himself off wasn’t working, and hadn’t been working for however long he’d been like that.

Fuck, I was so proud of him, just for overcoming that little feat. Because to him, and to me by extension, it was a more than just a little feat. It was a huge fucking deal.

* * *

“Do you have a four?”

I swept my eyes through the cards in my hand, took note of my lack of a four, and shook my head. “Go fish.”

Tweek grumbled and reached into the pile, irritably flicking up the card from the top of the deck. He looked up at me and gave me one of those small smiles, saying, “Picked up a four,” like it was something actually, you know, important.

“Fantastic,” I said with an eye roll. “Give me your five.”

He made a scandalized noise, coming from the back of his throat. “NGH! What the fuck? I asked you for that last round, why didn’t you give it me?!”

“I picked it up right after you asked me,” I said, holding out a hand. “Give it to me.”

He grumbled again, throwing the card in my direction. “You know, if you’re going to be an asshole, at least be _polite_ about it, you dick.”

I barely caught the card between two fingers and made a show of pairing it with the five in my hand. “I’m winning, I don’t have to be polite.”

Before Tweek could get mad and yell at me, I heard a high-pitched ringing coming from my bedside table. I dropped my hands and glared in my phone’s direction. I knew who was calling before I even read the name on the screen, and I was already furious. Because I _just_ wanted an entire day with my Tweek back. He was finally starting to get better, (little by little, step by step, but he was _getting_ there), and I knew that just an afternoon of him and I in our dorm room doing stupid shit was going to work wonders for him. Returning to routine, reverting back to comfortable normalcy, I was sure he would appreciate the simplicity.

But. Nope. And, just to make sure I was right, I leaned over and read the name:

Clyde.

I _knew_ it was that asshole. I fucking knew it. Why the _fuck_ he wanted to spend so much time with me, I had no fucking clue. It was like with Travis; I was such a dick to him, but for some reason he still felt the need to be around me.

“Are you going to answer it?” Tweek asked, gathering his cards together and plopping them face down on my bed.

I glanced over at Tweek, feeling part of my stomach fall away when I realized that Tweek was probably going to say yes to hanging out with Clyde and the guys, (because he always did), and that meant I had to too. “I don’t want to talk to him.”

“He’ll just call again --”

“So I’ll ignore him again --”

Tweek rolled his eyes, lifting himself up off of his stomach and crossing his legs in front of him. “Then he’ll come here. You know he will.”

I groaned, narrowing my eyes pleadingly at Tweek.

But Tweek rolled his eyes, ripping the cards from my hand and dropping them in a haphazard pile between us. “Just answer it. Because he’s just gonna get worse.”

Well. He had a fucking point there. Clyde could get really fucking annoying if you ignored him. He loved attention. So, with a long groan and a pointed glare in Tweek’s direction, I reached over and snatched up my phone and let my finger hover over the green answer button. I _really_ didn’t want to deal with Clyde. I just wanted Tweek and Craig Time, was that really so much to ask?

I took his call, and lifted it up to my ear. “What do you want, Clyde?”

I could hear the smile in his voice. “ _Hey, Craig._ ”

“Hi,” I said in a deadpan voice. “What do you want?”

“ _The guys are all at Kenny and Stan’_ ,” Clyde stated, like he just assumed I was going to jump on the bandwagon and hop my way over to force myself into company I didn’t want. “ _And you’re coming_.”

I frowned. “But I hate you guys.”

I didn’t want to see them for two reasons: 1) Tweek had been having a real shit couple weeks, and 2) I, as previously stated, hated them. I opened my mouth to argue, but before I could, I felt a hand on my shoulder. I glanced at Tweek and saw him looking up at me with his big hazel eyes. I could see the ‘yes’ in the way the skin around his eyes were relaxed and the lines around his mouth had smoothed some. “It’ll be fine, Craig.”

I moved the phone from my mouth and asked, raising an eyebrow at him, “Are you sure?”

“Positive,” he said, flashing me a wide, genuine smile, which I had begun to consider a rarity, so I decided to trust him, and hoped that that was the right thing to do. It was probably his way to try to get things to go back to normal, which was something that I begrudgingly understood and accepted.

“Okay,” I said, relenting. “I guess Tweek and I will come.”

 _"Awesome_ ,” Clyde said, that stupid smile still in his voice. “ _We’re all already here!_ ”

I was pretty sure Clyde was allergic to planning because him just telling us that we had to be somewhere right then and there meant I had zero time to mentally prepare to deal with the asshole quartet.

And I usually needed at _least_ fifteen minutes to get ready to tolerate their bullshit.

* * *

“No, see, that’s retarded. Even if we got that many cats, we’d have to get them all to keep still enough to dump the soda on them,” was the first thing I heard when Tweek and I entered Kenny and Stan’s apartment. Courtesy of that asshole Stan.

As I turned the corner into the living room, I did a quick survey of who was sitting where, so I knew which areas of the room to avoid. Cartman, Kyle, and Stan were manning one of the couches, Kenny was in his usual armchair, and Token was sitting beside Clyde on the other couch. That saved the love seat for Tweek and I. Good.

Kyle was shaking his head at Stan’s comment. “This doesn’t even make sense, I don’t think it matters what type of liquid it is. I think cats just don’t like to get wet at all.”

“Well maybe there’s something with acid, that cats hate more than just normal water,” Stan retorted.

I pulled Tweek over to the love seat, saying as we went, “Are you guys high?” That would be the only logical explanation for their topic of conversation, because it couldn’t possibly be something they’d just been _thinking_ about.

Kyle rolled his eyes to the ceiling. “Cartman had the brilliant idea of getting a bunch of cats and dumping various liquids on them to see which one made the cats the angriest. Ignoring the fact that that completely defies the scientific method --”

“Shut the fuck up, Kahl --”

“It’s also a stupid idea,” Kyle continued, ignoring Cartman’s flat voice. “And for some reason Stan’s on Cartman’s side.”

“I’m just saying it’s an interesting idea,” Stan defended himself, folding his arms over his chest like a fucking child. “I didn’t say it wasn’t stupid.”

“Yeah, sure you didn’t,” Token said sarcastically.

I decided that maybe I’d end the ‘debate’, (which, when referring to those assholes, meant ‘pointless bickering about dumb shit’), by interjecting. “Well, if you’re looking for someone else’s opinion, I think it’s _really_ stupid.”

“We didn’t need another opinion, but thanks anyway, asshole,” Cartman answered, blank-voiced and clearly done with everything.

Tweek did his little “GAH!” thing, and gripped my hand tightly. “I think it’s stupid, too!”

“We didn’t need _your_ opinion, either --”

Ughhhhh. I didn’t even want to be there to begin with, so being shit on, and watching Tweek get shit on, was not going to fly with me. I could easily be back in my dorm room with Tweek, destroying him at Go Fish and stealing a kiss when he got frustrated. “Listen,” I interrupted irritably. “If I’m going to be here, at least don’t be a fucking dick.”

“No one’s keeping you here,” Stan said, rolling his eyes when I glanced over at him.

“I am,” Clyde offered helpfully.

I nodded in agreement, pleased that Clyde was at least willing to take responsibility for being a dick. “Yeah, and I don’t want to deal with Clyde’s bullshit right now.”

Clyde didn’t seem very fazed by this, which just proved that he was aware that he was a dick, but didn’t care enough to _stop_ being a dick.

Jesus, the amount of time I’d been thinking of the word ‘dick’ that afternoon was incredible, in the worst possible definition. Because they were such fucking dicks, and I found myself questioning why I subjected myself to their company. But the shaky hand that was clasped in mine reminded me.

“Whatever,” Cartman said, waving the rest of the conversation off. “While we’re all here, we should play poker. And the twitch has graced us with his royal presence. Should make things interesting --”

I was on the verge of reprimanding Cartman for calling Tweek ‘titch’, (I thought that joke had died, like months ago), but was promptly cut off from saying anything when Tweek gently patted my forearm and shook his head sternly. All words died on my lips. At least he saved me from an argument.

“I’m down,” Stan said, followed by vague, mostly half-excited affirmations from everyone else in the room.

“Bitchin’,” Kenny said, swinging his legs over the armrest and rose to his feet. He stretched his arms up and made that weird groan sound that people make when they’re stretching for like no fucking reason. “I’ll go get the poker table.”

Finally a turn around for the night. Not only did I get the chance to play poker again, (I really fucking missed poker nights with the guys when I left for Middle Town), but I also got the chance to see how Tweek behaved when he played poker. If he was that bad at chilling the fuck out when we played fucking _war_ , I couldn’t imagine how awful his poker face was going to be.

 

And to answer my question from earlier in the evening: really fucking terrible. Tweek’s breath hitched and he grinned widely whenever he got a good hand, and he groaned and rolled his eyes when he got a bad one. It was like he wasn’t even trying.

I nudged him with my elbow after I had won yet another round, and said, “You need to work on your poker face. You’re like an open book.”

“ERK! I can’t _help_ it!” he answered, folding his arms over his chest, a disgruntled look crossing his face.

“Just do like I do,” I responded, pointing at my face with my index finger. I forced a purposeful blank expression to illustrate what a good poker face looked like.

Tweek rolled his eyes and punched me on the shoulder. “Not everyone can be a soulless robot, though.”

“Craig’s got a soul,” Clyde chimed in. “It’s just really, really shy.”

I glanced over at Clyde and said to him, “Shut the fuck up.”

“I love impromptu poker nights,” Kyle said with a grin, his eyes sweeping the room almost fondly. The sentimental bastard, he was almost as bad as Stan. “It’s fun.”

Cartman groaned and poked Kyle in the cheek. “Shut the fuck up, Kahl.”

A ferocious scowl immediately replaced Kyle’s smile, but, before he could yell at anyone, Cartman stood up from his folding chair and announced to the entire room, “Be right back, gotta take a dump.”

“Gross, Cartman,” Kyle said, his face scrunching up in disgust as he leaned away from his boyfriend. “You don’t have to tell us that.”

Cartman got this obnoxious smirk on his face and tugged on one of the flaps of Kyle’s hat, looking awfully pleased at the annoyed grunt he received in response. “I do if it makes you make that face.” And with those words, Cartman left, leaving everyone in the room to bask in the brief moment of reprieve from his assholeness.

It was weird. The second Cartman left the room, things instantly got at the very least slightly more pleasant. There was a stigma that surrounded Cartman. Or maybe it was less of a stigma and more of a concrete fact. He was just an unpleasant person, and probably the only person that didn’t feel that slight sigh of relief at his departure was Kyle. And even he seemed happy to have a break.

Everyone leaned back in their chairs, putting the next game on hold until Cartman came back. This just meant they were going to start talking again; one of the reasons I liked poker so much was because it made everyone shut up for the most part. Of course, they would drop the occasional stupid comment, but eventually they would shut the fuck up whenever someone either had a really good fucking hand, or they were duped to all hell by me.

Because I was really good at duping.

“How’re you and Wendy doing?”

Ughhhh for a second time. Of all the things they could’ve been talking about, why did Clyde have to bring _that_ up? He knew how Stan could get about Wendy; that question was bound to end up two different ways: either we were going to get a taste of obnoxiously lovesick Stan, or a bitter Stan that was willing to take the opportunity to bash his probably ex-girlfriend.

Guess it was the former, judging by the wide smile that crossed Stan’s face. “She put out.”

“Jesus, _finally_ ,” Kenny said, shuffling the cards absentmindedly.

“I know,” Stan agreed emphatically. “She told me abstaining from sex was probably hurting our relationship more that it was helping it. Something about forcing an imbalance between mind, body, and soul?”

“Naw, she was probably just horny and wanted some dick,” Kenny said casually. “Really independent girls can be like that.”

Stan looked torn, probably balancing between wanting to agree with him, but also defending his girlfriend’s purity or whatever. Ultimately, he just shrugged. “Probably.”

“Speaking of dick,” Kenny said, turning his eyes to Tweek and I. “Haven’t seen you guys in forever. How’s it going?”

I figured I’d let Tweek take care of how he wanted to answer. I wasn’t sure how much detail Tweek wanted to go into, (probably not a whole lot, though, but Tweek was really good at surprising me, so I didn’t want to make any assumptions).

Tweek’s response was simply, “GAH! NGH! I’m alive!”

“Aren’t we all,” Clyde answered sagely. What a fucking moron.

“You’re doing okay?” Kenny asked, keeping his eyes fixed to Tweek while keeping his voice casual enough to not give anything away to the other guys.

Tweek glanced at me with a swallow, but then quickly nodded his head. “GAH! Yeah, man! Why wouldn’t I be okay?”

Kenny looked skeptical. Which made sense, Tweek wasn’t being very inconspicuous. “Just asking.”

There was a beat of silence, so I wrapped an arm around Tweek’s shoulders and said, “We’re okay.” Tweek nodded emphatically alongside me.

There was another long stretch of silence, broken by Token, who said, his fingers drumming on the rickety card table thoughtfully, “You know I’ve been thinking. Did we just abandon the car-thing?”

It took me a second to remember what he was talking about, but when I did, I rolled my eyes. It was that stupid idea they had a couple weeks back. The whole ‘stage car breakdowns so we can help strangers and demand payment’ thing. They must’ve scrapped it pretty much immediately after they thought of it, because I hadn’t caught a whiff of them making any move to make it happen.

“We thought it over and realized it was stupid,” Stan answered.

I glared at him. “Why couldn’t you guys have done that when we were kids? It would’ve saved me like a million migraines. And $100.”

“We were stupid when we were kids.” Kyle said with a shrug.

I frowned. “You’re stupid now. And dating an obese anti-Semitic racist, so --”

At that moment, Cartman had just come out of the bathroom, so he caught only the comment I had made to Kyle. Which was a bad thing. Mostly because he was probably going to be an obnoxious dick about me making fun of his boyfriend. And, sure enough, he looked at me with a scowl and said, tucking his phone into his pant pocket, “ _Eh_! At least he’s not dating a twitchy meth head!”

A loud, angry growl came from beside me, and what happened after that happened so quickly, I almost didn’t see it. One moment, Tweek was sitting in the frigid metal folding chair next to me, his shoulders resting uncomfortably under my arm, and the next he was on his feet, his body ripped from my hold. I was startled at first, and watched, dumbstruck, as he swerved around the table in Cartman’s direction, his legs moving so quickly they blurred reality. With a wild howl, he shoved Cartman into the wall harshly and gripped the front of his shirt, shaking him back and forth, slamming his back into the drywall. “ _Shut the fuck up!_ ” he screeched, saliva flecking on Cartman’s fat face.

My mouth dropped open in shock, and I stood up so fast I felt an ache in my knees, but ignored it and hurried over to what could possibly turn into an active crime scene. When I made it to the both of them, I wrapped my arms around Tweek’s midsection and tried to pry him off of Cartman.

“ _I’m not a fucking meth head_!” he shouted angrily, struggling against me. “ _I’m_ not! ”

I grunted. Tweek really was way stronger than he looked. And he was determined to not let go. “Tweek -- honey, calm down --”

“ _I’m not on meth, I was_ never _on meth_ \--”

I finally managed to get Tweek back a couple steps, wrenching Cartman’s sweatshirt from between Tweek’s trembling fingers, but that didn’t mean his fight was all out of him. He was still pushing against me and trying to get at Cartman again, a look of insurmountable rage on his face. He looked genuinely capable of murder, which was why I needed to get him away from everyone else as soon as possible. I mumbled to him, my voice shaky from the efforts of restraining him, “I know you weren’t, just take a deep breath, alright? You need to calm down --”

“ _No! I won’t calm down! Why the fuck does everyone just let you get away with shit?!_ ”

Cartman looked speechless, his hands clutching at his throat like Tweek had been choking him. He looked actually scared for once in his life, tears in the corners of his eyes and his mouth hanging open.

Good. Only an absolute maniac wouldn’t be afraid of an enraged Tweek. He could be . . . pretty fucking scary. And I mean, it wasn’t like Cartman didn’t deserve a good ass-kicking, but I was nervous to let Tweek beat him up. He wasn’t exactly in his right mind, and had been a little spacey for the better part of two weeks.

“ _If Craig wasn’t here to hold me back, you’d be fucking_ dead _right now! I’D RIP YOU IN HALF!_ ”

At those words, I desperately started to pull Tweek away. I could feel the rage radiating off of him in waves, and I needed him to calm the fuck down or I was sure he’d have an aneurysm. He let me, although that was probably less of wanting to calm down, and more of not knowing what to do with the anger that was boiling over.

I barely remembered to grab our coats on the way out, and Tweek called into the full apartment before the front door closed behind us, “I’m not on meth, you _fucking_ asshole! I’m _not_!”

* * *

About halfway back to our dorm room, Tweek finally stopped shaking. You’d think that was a good thing, but it was actually horrible, because he’d fallen into this state of apathy that impressed the Tucker in me, but worried the Craig. He was leaning into me -- which was good, at least he wasn’t pushing me away -- but he kept his eyes to the ground and every worry line on his face was smoothed out, his lips relaxed and in a straight line, his steps robotic and completely reliant on me. If I wasn’t there to guide him back to our dorm building, he probably would’ve just wandered off and gotten lost.

He was back to the way he’d been before. But for some reason, it felt worse.

When I pulled open the dorm building’s front door, Tweek just mechanically walked inside. He was so still, he wasn’t even shivering from the February weather. Our departure was so hasty, and Tweek was so hesitant to let me coddle him, that his coat, albeit on him, wasn’t zipped. So his misbuttoned shirt exposed part of his stomach to the below-freezing air. And, although Tweek was impressively impervious to colder weather, he would always shiver at least a little bit on the way to wherever we might’ve been going.

Tweek waited for me to join him before we climbed up the steps together, our hands clasped tightly at our sides. His steps were calculated, and not the jerky, random, offbeat steps he normally walked in, which meant he didn’t even come close to tripping over any of the steps on the way up to the third floor.

I had my key out of my pocket before we got there so we didn’t have to wait around where other people could see us, and, when the door was unlocked, I held it open for him. Again, he just stalked inside, his face still completely emotionless.

I watched him quietly, trying to figure out some way to at least try to make him feel better. My eyes swept around the room, before landing on his coffee maker, and I nodded decisively. “I’ll make you some coffee,” I said to him, clapping him on the shoulder and squeezing tight. I was really, really happy he’d taught me how to do it, because if he hadn’t, I would’ve been totally lost. Tweek just nodded, and made his way across the room, sitting himself in the center of my bed and curling his hands into his shirt sleeve.

I fiddled with his coffee maker, and, as the water was heating up, I pulled my phone from my pocket and sent a quick text to Clyde.

_What’s going on on your end?_

He answered immediately.

_Cartmans crying and Kyles PISSED at him they might actualy break up this time_

_But other than that Everyones just really confused_

_Is everything ok?_

I shrugged as an answer, and just typed back,

 _Don’t know yet. Can you keep everyone calm? I don’t want this getting out of hand_.

He answered,

_Sre dude_

_Hope tweeks feels better, give him a hug for me_

I felt a little . . . heart-warmed that Clyde sent me that. But I pushed that down for the time being and typed back,

_Okay. Tweek’s not leaving my sight for the next lifetime, anyway, so I’m sure I’ll get around to it at some point._

And then I pocketed my phone again. I glanced at Tweek over my shoulder as his coffee brewed and sighed. He was sitting on my bed, his legs tucked into his chest, and his eyes fixed to his lap, his face expressionless. I tapped my foot irritably and impatiently, and, when the coffee finally dribbled to a stop in his favorite lime green mug, I picked it up by the handle, (I had no idea how Tweek could touch that thing when it was broiling hot), and carried it over to Tweek.

I handed him the mug and sat beside him, immediately wrapping an arm around his shoulders and tugging him into my side. Tweek allowed me to move him listlessly, his face blank and emotionless as he stared down at the settling black liquid in his favorite lime green mug. “You want to tell me what that was?”

“It was nothing,” he said flatly, and, even though he wasn’t pulling away from me, I was still very dissatisfied by his body language and his tone of voice. Because it was _exactly_ like the couple weeks before, only it hurt more, because I felt like we’d made so much progress in just one day, (which meant he was well on his way to healing, at least temporarily, from what was ailing him), and then Cartman, (that fucking asshole, Jesus fucking Christ), had to push Tweek back like five giant steps, and I felt like I had to start all over again just to get Tweek to smile.

“It was something, Tweek,” I said gently, resting my cheek on the top of his head. “Please tell me.”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Because this isn’t something I talk about. Ever.”

“Is it the --”

I didn’t get a chance to get the rest of the words out, before Tweek nodded sharply and said, his voice insinuating his desire for me to drop the subject, “Yeah.”

So I at least knew what his huge secret was about now. And I didn’t know how to respond to that, because no matter how many times I asked, and no matter how persuasive I was, I knew Tweek wasn’t going to say anything more about it. And I guess I was partially right, but Tweek definitely didn’t seem to be done talking.

“Why are people so horrible, Craig?” he had asked into the silence, his voice cracking. He turned his face into my neck and nuzzled the exposed skin. “Why can’t they just be nice? Or at least _decent_ , Jesus _Christ_.”

“I don’t know, sweetheart,” I said quietly, pressing a kiss to the top of his head. “I don’t know.”

“Why did he have to say that?” Tweek asked, his voice picking up momentum but not lifting from that subdued acceptance of the situation. “He fucking knew not to!”

“He has no moral compass. Cartman doesn’t care if he hurts anyone. It doesn’t affect him, he does it to everyone --”

“No, that’s bullshit!” he said loudly, lifting his head from my shoulder and freeing himself from hold. With wild eyes, he lifted his favorite lime green mug up to his lips, downed the rest of his coffee in three gulps and promptly threw the mug at the floor as hard as he could. It shattered, bits of ceramic dancing along the floorboards, a few droplets of stray dark coffee spilling from the shards. “It’s _not fair_ , Craig!”

Holy shit, I remember thinking in shock. I was rendered me completely speechless and just sat on my bed and stared at him.

A few seconds later, Tweek seemed to come to and realized what he’d done. He looked speechless at his own actions, and turned his eyes to the floor in horror, his hands lifting up to his hair and yanking tightly, clumps tearing and raining around him. A quiet sob hiccuped from his chest and tears pooled in the corners of his eyes, and he squeezed them shut. “Oh God!”

I was on my feet in an instant, and wrapped my arms around his trembling frame. It was a troubling reminder of just the night before, and how in only twenty four hours, what little progress we’d actually made seemed to stutter and rewind at an alarmingly fast rate. Tweek hunched into my hug, his arms pulled into his chest and his face pressed into the space just below my shoulder.

“Tweek, honey,” I said quietly, trying to lull him into a somewhat state of calm. I knew it was futile, at least for the time being, but I figured I’d at least try to lull him to some semblance of peace.

I ran my hands up and down his back, giving the top of his head several, slow kisses and hushed him as he broke down in astronomical proportions, for the second time in two days. And through all of his sobs, the only thing I could make out clearly was the sudden, broken explanation of,

“I fucking _hate_ February.”

And then I just let him cry. Again. Just like the night before, I didn’t know what else to do, because there really wasn’t much else I _could_ do. He needed to let out his emotions somehow, and I guess crying was what Tweek needed, but fuck, it was just as hard as the second time around.

 

Maybe five minutes later, Tweek had stopped crying. His breaths were jerky, but he had his entire body weight  resting completely on top of me, the tightness of his hold on me being the only indication that he was still awake. I ran my fingers through his hair, keeping a firm hold on his waist; I didn’t know what to say, so I waited for him to speak again.

It took awhile, but Tweek finally managed to talk, even though his voice was so hushed and hoarse I could hardly hear it.

“Can we lay down?”

I removed my arms from around him, and said, “Let me clean up first. Give me a second.” I gently released Tweek so as not to spook him, and then stooped to my knees at the scene of his mug murder. With my back turned to him so he couldn’t see me picking up shards of ceramic with my bare hands, I gathered up the remains o Tweek’s mug, and then dumped them in the trash bin just beside the desk.

When I turned back to Tweek, I was astonished at how hopeless and lost he looked, sitting on my bed all by himself, his arms wrapped around his midsection and his legs pressed tightly together, like he was trying to take up the least amount of room possible. I quickly joined him, pulling myself onto my mattress and resting my head on my pillow. Tweek followed, laying on his side and pressing himself tightly into me. I continued the ministrations I had abandoned just moments before, fingers carding through his hair, and a hand dragging circles on his back, patiently waiting -- very, very, very fucking patiently waiting -- for him to gather his thoughts and speak. I almost didn’t care what he said; the silence from him was killing me. It’d been killing me for weeks; I was used to this puppy-like human that complained about everything and fucking radiated light whenever he was happy and could blind me with his smile and somehow managed to make a game of Go Fish actually _fun_. And I was getting none of that from him, just complete and utter nothing.

We were still and quiet for so long that, had it not been for his jerky breathing, I would’ve thought he’d fallen asleep. Which meant I almost jumped out of my skin when I heard him say quietly,

“I love you okay? I love you so much sometimes it hurts.”

My breath hitched. It was such a sweet and seemingly innocent confession, but there was something about it that didn’t sit right with me. He sounded so desperate, and I didn’t understand why. He knew I loved him, he knew I loved him more than anything. And it wasn’t exactly a secret that he loved me; there wasn’t a doubt in my mind that my Tweek loved me, so his desperation seemed so worryingly out of place.

“I know you do,” I said, petting his hair gently.

“It’s just . . . I’m just so . . .” Tweek let out a shaky breath, and he nuzzled his face into my neck, like he was trying to escape my concerned gaze. “Fuck, I’m _scared_ , Craig, and I don’t know how to stop.”

I felt another ache in my chest at his admission, and, because how the fuck do you respond to that? I remained silent. The last time he’d said that to me was the first time I’d seen him cry, when he first came out to me, and I had had enough of my Tweek crying. He didn’t deserve that, he deserved happiness. All of the happiness.

“I don’t want to tell you,” he added, voice hesitant, and like he was worried I was going to be angry.

And sure, maybe I was a little. But I wasn’t angry with him for being scared. I wasn’t angry with him actively protecting a terrible secret that he didn’t want to confide in anyone. I was angry at . . . well, I wasn’t sure why I was angry. I just was. It was a really anger-inducing situation. But luckily that particular confession didn’t leave me speechless, because I had plenty to say about Tweek’s apparent inability to trust me. “You can tell me anything, you know that --”

“I know,” he said, burying his face in my neck. “I don’t want you to hate me --”

“I could never hate you,” I said, the words a gut reaction to his concerns. “Not ever.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I do.”

“How?”

“Because it’s not possible for me to love you more than I do right now,” I answered, brushing my fingers through his hair. “And if I do, my heart will explode.” It was the truth, and, even if it was kind of an embarrassing truth to tell him, and a truth that I wanted to keep to myself until the day I died, I knew he needed to hear it.

But, as sure as I was that that was going to calm him down, he didn’t answer me.

I sighed. “I won’t pressure you. Tell me whenever you’re ready. My door’s always open. For you, anyway.”

Tweek hummed, but it wasn’t that contented hum that I was used to, but more of a noise of agreement, and his body deflated against me. “Once February is over, it’ll be gone.”

That was a . . . weird response, and I didn’t know how to react. I didn’t know how to react to a lot of the things Tweek did and said, but that last part was too vague and ominous. It didn’t make any fucking sense, but I didn’t get a chance to ask any questions, because he cleared his throat and said, “I’m gonna . . . sleep.”

I let out a long breath through my nose, and pressed a slow kiss to the top of his head. “Okay. Goodnight, honey.”

Tweek definitely didn’t go to sleep right away. He probably just said that to stop me questioning him more. We stayed that way for a while, both lost in thought. I didn’t know what Tweek was thinking, but I was just trying to figure out why the fuck he had freaked out so much, and how the hell I was going to help him when he eventually told me.

 

A long while later, Tweek finally fell asleep. It was gradual, though, so it took me a while to really determine whether or not he was still conscious. But his breathing was even, albeit slightly faster than normal, and his muscles had relaxed completely.

I sighed and just laid there for awhile. I just . . . I was at a loss. I know I’ve said this a lot, but Jesus, how do you act in a situation like that? It felt hopeless to me, and I couldn’t imagine how it felt to Tweek.

I needed some time to think. And, because he was such a heavy sleeper, I was able to squirm out of Tweek’s vice grip. I slowly lifted up the blanket and slipped out of bed, tucking the covers around Tweek’s heated body to make up for the absence of my presence.

When he looked as comfortable as he was going to get, I glanced away and rubbed at my eyes. He was killing me, slowly killing me. And the second I looked away from him, I felt something inside of me darken. Those soft, warm feelings that he gave me disintegrated when I was the only one awake, and I was able to think back on what happened without being distracted by the warmth of his skin, or the smell of his hair.

It felt cold. And I mean, I’d felt that brand of anger before, several times in high school for several different reasons, but usually when I felt like the world was crashing around me, I would get drunk or high. Or I’d shoplift. Or I’d beat some kid up at school for looking at me wrong.

But I had none of those options, so that feeling of blind rage was even worse without an outlet. Either way, though, it’d been awhile since I’d been that monumentally pissed off. I’d almost forgotten what it felt like. And I didn’t know what to do with the constant rush of adrenaline in my veins.

Well. Almost.

I grabbed my phone from my bedside table and impulsively dialed Clyde’s phone number. He answered after the second ring. “ _Craig_?”

He was talking loudly to stand out against the shouting that was coming from his end. Well, one voice was shouting, and it was clearly Kyle, judging by how shrill the screeching was. But all I could make out was, “ _Why the_ fuck _would you do that, you fucking asshole!_ ”

“What’s going on?” I asked flatly, but quietly, so the risk of waking Tweek was lessened.

The shouts faded slowly, which probably just meant Clyde left the room, and he sounded very confused. “ _Well, we’re all just trying to figure out what’s going on_ \--” There was a loud banging sound, (probably the front door), and then Clyde added, “ _Well, everyone but Stan, Kenny, and Kyle are here trying to figure out what’s going on. How’s Tweek doing?_ ”

“Sleeping,” I said. “I’ll be there in ten minutes. Make sure no one else leaves.” I hung up the phone without waiting for a response.

* * *

I knocked on the door to Stan and Kenny’s apartment, switching my weight between both of my feet. I only had to wait like five seconds for someone to answer the door, but that felt like way too fucking long.

It was Clyde. “Hey, Craig --”

I grunted, pushing passed him into the apartment. I could hear Cartman laughing, and the sound made my blood boil hotly, and I practically stomped my way into the living room. True to Clyde’s word, Stan, Kyle, and Kenny were missing, but everyone else in the room had returned to their seats around the couches.

Cartman was reclined comfortably, and confidently, on a couch by himself, his hands folded behind his head. He looked completely normal, like the events just an hour prior hadn’t happened at all. Like his life hadn’t been threatened by 118 pounds of ferocious Tweek. In the moment, Cartman looked so fucking terrified, but now it was like it was no big deal. And there was something about that that pissed me off even more than I already was, because it shouldn’t have been humanly possible to erase the image of an enraged Tweek from his memory. It was one of those things that you just _don’t_ forget.

And, judging by the casual smirk on his face, Cartman seemed to have moved on with his life.

Good for fucking him.

Everybody stared at me as soon as they saw me. I couldn’t keep the anger from my face, my cheeks were flushed, and my vision was blurry. I could feel myself shaking, but I held myself up high, my shoulders squared.

I barely registered Token asking cautiously, “How’s Tweek doing?” Fucking barely, my ears were ringing as I met Cartman’s half-lidded eyes, a casual smirk on his face as he looked me up and down.

“Please, he’s fine,” he said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “I bet he just needed his dick sucked; you know, I’m always telling Kahl --”

But I didn’t let him finish. I crossed the room in two steps and leaned over him, fisting the front of his shirt tightly. I lifted him up from the couch by his shirt, making sure the fabric dug into his neck. God that fucking, fucking, _fucking_ asshole; I couldn’t distinguish my thoughts from one another, because I was _so fucking pissed_. There were some faint sounds of panic coming from around me, but it was either half-hearted, or I was really just that pissed off and couldn’t detect one voice from another. I was entirely focused on the fat piece of shit that was staring back at me with wide eyes, his mouth hanging open in shock.

I leaned forward, and whispered in his ear,

“ _Say anything like that to him again, and I’ll make sure you never say_ anything _again, you fat, worthless excuse for a human being._ ”

I pulled back again, and glared daggers into his watery eyes. “Understand?”

Cartman nodded quickly, and I felt him swallow thickly.

I pushed him down again, rolling my shoulders, and straightening my posture. “Good. And just so we’re clear, I make good on my threats,” I said, keeping my voice even and dangerous. “Don’t fucking test me. You will lose.”

Cartman started to sniffle, but I just rolled my eyes, and turned away without another word.  

* * *

It was really fucking cold on the walk back to my dorm room, and, after I had calmed down some, I realized how useless that trip was, for two reasons. One: it probably wasn’t going to work, because Cartman would never change. Clearly. And two: If Tweek knew I’d gone and done that, he’d probably be furious with me. He’d probably take it as me fighting for him or something. But I knew for a fact that he’d do the same for me if the situation was reversed. It was an instinctual protectiveness; I wanted to shield Tweek from the world the same way that Tweek wanted to shield me from the world.

We just wanted to keep each other safe.

* * *

Tweek was still sleeping by the time I’d gotten back, in the same position as I’d left him in. I watched him for awhile, my back pressed up against the closed dorm room door and my hands shoved in my pockets. His chest was rising and falling rhythmically, (quickly, though, faster than was normal for the average person), and I could just barely make out his face in what little light the moon offered. He looked troubled; his eyebrows were quirked and his blanket clutched up to his chest.

I didn’t realize it was possible to care about someone that much.

I remembered Kenny telling me on the first day of classes, when I reconnected with the assholes from South Park, that once I get a boyfriend or girlfriend, I’d understand what it meant to love someone in the way that Kenny loved Butters. I didn’t believe him, it sounded ridiculous; I mean, you love someone after one year of being in a relationship with them, when you’re just barely an adult? It sounded fucking stupid. I just assumed Kenny was either dumb or insane.

But Tweek and I had been together for fucking two months, and I couldn’t imagine loving him more than I did in that moment. It didn’t seem possible. My chest was churning almost painfully, and that compulsion to protect him from the fucking world was making my fucking teeth hurt.

Letting out a long breath, I propelled myself off the door and quietly crossed the room, my feet padding slightly against the wooden floor of our dorm room. Carefully lifting up the covers, I climbed into bed next to him, dropping the blanket over top of me, and laid on my side facing him. He was still curled into a ball, his arms crossed in front of his chest, and his mouth was open just slightly.

He was so sweet. Well, except when he wasn’t, but I was willing to overlook that. Either way, he just wanted the world to be a good, safe place, and you can’t ever fault someone on that. He had a crushing hope for the world that seemed to contradict his paranoia of his surroundings, but I knew he just wanted to be able to trust people.

But it seemed like the world didn’t want that for him.

A surge of sudden anger swept through my chest at that final thought, disrupting the calm sadness that had been there just moments before. Why the fuck couldn’t he just be _safe_? Why did all this shit have to happen to him? Although I never allowed most religions to have logical merits, if Tweek’s Buddhist faith was right, his karma should’ve been good. He should’ve been given the opportunities that he deserved, not dealt a hand of absolute shit.

I didn’t like where my mind was heading, so I closed my eyes and breathed deeply to calm myself down.

“I don’t know what to do, Tweek,” I whispered, draping an arm over his waist and pulling him close to me. “I have no fucking clue, I’ve never cared about anyone this much before. You’re my _everything_.”

But telling his sleeping body that didn’t do anything to make me feel better. And it did even less to make him feel better.

I just wanted it all to be over.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! A comment is always appreciated!


End file.
